


Anatomy of Fear

by MayMarlow



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: BWL!Neville, Best Friends to Lovers, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Necromancer!Harry, Pining, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Slow Romance, Slytherin!Harry
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-21
Updated: 2020-11-13
Packaged: 2021-03-05 06:21:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 22,981
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25429834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MayMarlow/pseuds/MayMarlow
Summary: Harry Potter didn’t think he asked for much – just to be left alone to live his life and get through Hogwarts without other people trying to elbow their way into his heart. Draco Malfoy, all elbows, begs to differ. This weird little kid is going to be his best friend, come hell or high water.The necromancy thing was a bit of a surprise, though.(This fic used to be known as Post Mortem/Dawn of Day).
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 214
Kudos: 783
Collections: why I only sleep an hour a night





	1. Time Will Change a Familiar Face

**ARC 1: DAWN OF DAY**

_He lieth still, he doth not move,  
he will not see the Dawn of Day  
he hath no other life above  
he gave me a friend and a true truelove_

_A.Tennyson_

Mordred’s Mend was an odd house.

_Bayu Bayushki Bayu_

It stood all by its lonesome deep in the Northern Woods, where the trees were dead, and the roads were alive. Sunlight could never quite reach through the branches to warm the icy creeks and hollow burrows, leaving everything in a permanent state of early winter. The silence that reigned in these woods tapped the windows of the house at night.

Creatures, however, knew better than to come near.

The large house built of grey stone did not make for an inviting sight with its small windows and narrow doors and strange runes carved into the ground around it. Inside, the light wooden floors were polished and the frames that hung on the walls were void of paintings. And though the thick curtains covering the numerous small windows did nothing to silence the nightly tapping from outside, they did well enough to be kept up and closed, never to be taken down.

The doors and windows were sealed shut at night, though whether it was to prevent the Woods from entering or the House from exiting, it was hard to tell. It certainly wasn’t a place that would allow for midnight wandering or late-night celebrations.

It was the only home Harry Potter had ever known.

_do not lie down near the edge of the bed_

There were some truths he knew about the House, though he had never questioned why they had remained despite it all. It was as clear to him as anything - the sky was empty, the woods were dark, and the Potters lived in Mordred’s Mend. And just like he knew that, he knew that the birds with bent necks were looking at him, and that the house-elves were scared of him, that the portraits were empty because of him, and that the corridors in this House weren’t safe.

His mother never could tell him why - well, she didn’t tell him much at all anymore - but the corridors weren’t _safe_. Most days he didn’t think the _rooms_ were safe either, and all he could do was brace for a horror that never came. He’d stay up the nights fearing the dark, desperately wishing for a bit of light to make him breathe easier. He’d been told of spells that could light the tip of a wand he didn’t have yet, and he desperately dreamed of a time when he could have that.

There were footsteps that belonged to nobody that would roam at night, the faint humming of the walker alluring and repulsive all in one. And when the morning would come, Harry would still be awake, expecting the house-elves that would come to wake him up, shaking as they approached, fearing him as much as he feared the House.

And when the silent darkness would become almost sentient, all Harry could do was sing quietly to himself - quiet, shaky little lullabies his godfather had taught him. The footsteps would rush faster past his door when he sang, and the creaky floorboards would remain undisturbed. But he didn’t close his eyes, because that’s when things would happen - every blink was a gamble, and Harry didn’t want to lose.

_the grey wolf will come and grab you by your tiny side_

Things hadn’t been this bad at first. Not long ago his father had been alive and his mother had been aware and when the dark had become darker, he had been able to rest knowing his parents would be there for him. But then his father had _died_ and his mother had been so _sad_ and it had just made sense to— to bring him _back_. To bring his dad back.

Because little Harry knew he could.

It had been the reason why his parents had kept him away from the world outside after all: they’d told him that if anyone found out about the things he could do, they’d take him and never bring him back. And when he’d asked if what was _out there_ was worse than what was _in here_ , his mother had said _yes_ , and— and Harry didn’t want to risk it. And so he remained there, in that House, in Mordred’s Mend, seeing no one but his parents and his godfather.

When his dad had died and Harry had brought him back, things had gotten worse in the House. The _House_ had gotten worse. His mother, too. Where before she had been sadly flitting from room to room, crying and trying to make sure Harry was well, James’s return had done something to her.

Now all Harry could do was cover his ears and pretend he didn’t notice his mother – hair a mess, gowns stained, eyes vacant – wandering around with the rotting remains of his father – barely capable of shuffling after her anymore, pieces of his flesh dropping with every bump and jolt. The stench that kept Harry well-warned of their approach never bothered his mother, and all Harry could feel when he watched the two of them from a distance was regret.

_he’ll grab you by your tiny side and drag you to the forest_

Harry missed the days when his parents had been strict with him. Now no one told him when to sleep or eat or wash unless his godfather came to visit, and _that_ happened only on Saturdays. His Uncle Tony existed from Saturday to Saturday, as far as Harry was concerned, and while he appreciated the few hours he could spend with his godfather, it just… it just wasn’t _enough_.

He had once – fleetingly – thought about going with his godfather. Just stepping into that fireplace and leaving, but the whole idea had been so unrealistic. He had never done such a thing before, didn’t know if it was even possible for him to leave. And the one time he had dared to approach the fireplace – just to _see_ – his mother had screamed through her own delusions, nearly losing her breath as she chased Harry away.

No, leaving felt like an impossibility. And yet the last time Uncle Tony had been there, he’d mentioned school. Said something about sending Harry to school soon, and Lily had ignored him much like she ignored everything else aside from James’s corpse.

_drag you to the forest, down under a willow shrub_

But Uncle Tony was a patient, clever man. He had told Lily that they would continue the discussion next Saturday, and now Harry counted the days because… because what if it happened? What if Uncle Tony convinced Lily to send Harry to a school somewhere away from Mordred’s Mend?

 _‘I don’t think she’d agree to it,’_ Harry told himself, trying to not hope. Before James’s death Lily had made sure to have him read many of the boring, dusty and dry books they had in the house. She had told him that he’d need to know more than other children because other children didn’t need to _control_ their magic the way Harry did.

“You can do things others can’t,” Lily had told him often. “So you must learn how to control your magic in ways other people can’t.”

Harry hadn’t questioned that either. He had simply sat down to read about magical theory until his eyes burned, practiced pronouncing spells he couldn’t cast yet until his throat was sore, and memorized plants and ingredients until his head hurt. Back then he’d though he would love nothing more than for those lessons to end, but now even after his mother no longer cared enough to teach him, he sought comfort and familiarity in the routine of reading.

_don’t come around, wolf_

Saturday was a few days away, and all Harry could do was patiently wait while doing his best to not see either one of his parents. He desperately missed fresh air, but didn’t dare to venture out when he knew there’d be no one inside to call him back if he couldn’t return on his own. The Woods were almost as hungry as the House, and he didn’t wish to become nothing but a trail of fading footsteps in the ground.

Circe, if Uncle Tony could really convince Lily to send Harry to school. He’d get to be around students just like him—

Well, no. Not exactly _just like him_. Lily had said – _no one_ was quite like Harry. It was one of the few things that Lily and Uncle Tony were in agreement of, and they both had told him many, many times that should he ever encounter other people, he’d have to keep the things he could do a secret. Other people would fear him, he’d been told. They’d hate him. And while Harry didn’t know what exactly that entailed, he didn’t think he’d want to experience it.

“They don’t have the magic you do,” Uncle Tony had told him once. “Their lullabies do nothing. The darkness around them is empty. They have the peace of peasantry – the ignorant and the fool, lulled into a false sense of safety. You’re free of that, Harry. You’re not asleep.”

_don’t wake up our Harry_

And though his godfather had clearly meant well with what he’d said, sometimes… sometimes Harry wished he could’ve slept like other people did.

*

On Saturday Harry found James’s arm outside his bedroom.

He hoped it was a coincidence. He hoped that the limb had fallen off the rotten corpse as it shuffled after Lily. Because if that wasn’t the case, it meant that for some reason James’s corpse had come to stand outside Harry’s closed door overnight, and that just… that was _different_.

Harry didn’t trust things that changed without him knowing why.

He made sure that his door was locked when he went to take a bath and change into clean clothes to appear somewhat presentable before his godfather’s arrival. He had a frightened house-elf deliver his breakfast up to his bedroom, and ate in the safety of his domain. He didn’t know _when_ Uncle Tony would arrive - sometimes the man turned up early, sometimes in the afternoon - but wanted to be ready as soon as he did.

He couldn’t stop thinking about school.

He didn’t even know what it’d be like. Only that it’d have to be vastly different than what he had now.

It was a bit before lunch that a house-elf - different from the one in the morning, did they take turns or something? - popped in to tell him of an arriving guest. Harry, eager to see his godfather, hurried towards the fireplace, not caring to be wary of where Lily would be.

“Uncle Tony!”

His godfather was a tall man. He was pale, too, with dark hair and pale grey eyes. His robes were black and heavy, with small shifting runes sown into its corners and folds. The man’s wand was strapped into his arm, ready to be used at a moment’s notice. He didn’t smile when he saw Harry. Not that it mattered - Harry had never seen him smile, anyway.

“Harry,” Uncle Tony said, pulling the boy closer to take a proper look at him. “You’ve been well?”

“Yes.”

“Good. And where’s your mother?”

“I’m not sure.”

Uncle Tony let out a sigh, before proceeding to walk through the rooms of the first floor, Harry trailing behind him. They found Lily and James in the kitchen — Lily, digging through the pantry, and James, his remains standing still behind her. The stench was awful, but somehow waved away by a flick of a wand.

 _‘I want to learn that spell,’_ Harry thought. He didn’t know for how long Lily would keep James around, but didn’t think she’d let go anytime soon. He’d have to figure a way to coexist with the stench, somehow.

“I’m not interrupting, I hope,” Uncle Tony said. Lily startled, and whirled in the pantry to turn and take a peek at who had joined her in the kitchen. She smiled when she saw who it was.

“Antonin,” she said, the sweetness of her smile twisted by the rest of her appearance. “We’ve missed you! You haven’t been here in so long—”

“I was here a week ago.”

“—and James kept telling me that I should owl you but we know how busy you are, so we didn’t.”

“ _Please_ , you could’ve owled me at any time,” Uncle Tony replied, watching Lily with an expression that revealed the barest hint of disgust. It was funny, Harry had always thought, how despite being his godfather, Uncle Tony and his parents never acted like they were _friends_ , even before James had died. “In fact, I’ve been thinking that I haven’t spent nearly enough time with Harry, have I?”

“You’re always welcome to visit us here, James would love your company despite how quiet he’s been lately,” Lily said, smiling a little. “Harry’s been like that too. Really quiet.” Harry hunched his shoulders and hid further behind Uncle Tony. He didn’t want Lily to see him.

“I wouldn’t wish to disrupt your routine with James,” Uncle Tony said. “Harry will soon turn ten, won’t he? In a few weeks. How about you let him live with me for a little while? You two could—”

“Oh, no, no,” Lily interrupted, brushing her hand across James’s cheek, accidentally scraping a strip of skinn off his face. “That’s really sweet of you, but James doesn’t like when Harry leaves for a long time. He’s so paranoid about Harry’s secret, isn’t he? We don’t want anything to happen to him.”

“You son will eventually be leaving to attend school,” Uncle Tony reminded her. “Despite what I suggested last time—”

“If he has to go, then he will go to Hogwarts,” Lily replied, a tone of irritation breaking through the haze of happiness she usually lived in. “James and I attended Hogwarts - we want Harry to have that same experience.”

“Hogwarts will not be able to teach him what he needs to learn,” Uncle Tony said. “They know nothing of how to prepare him for life as someone capable of doing the things he can. In Hogwarts he’ll be doomed to hide that part of himself, suppress it and neglect it. Durmstrang—”

“Harry won’t tell. He will keep it a secret. He’s a good boy.”

“He _shouldn’t have to_ keep it a secret, Lily. How can he practice and become better if he’s hindered by the need to keep it all a secret?”

“It’ll be fine,” Lily cooed, eyes fixed on James again, clearly fading out of the conversation already. “People won’t focus on Harry. They will have the Boy-Who-Lived there. People will focus on that boy, not our Harry.”

“That Longbottom boy is dull as a—”

“You worry too much, Antonin. Harry can practice during the holidays - he studies so well on his own, you know. Everything will be fine. Everything _is_ fine.”

“Mastering necromancy needs more than just a few flimsy lessons a year, Lily,” Uncle Tony said, now audibly irritated. Harry gulped, feeling nervous. He knew his godfather had a temper, but the man rarely got angry around Harry. “In Durmstrang there are competent teachers who—”

“But we want Hogwarts for Harry. Not Durmstrang.”

Uncle Tony let out an angry hiss, before he turned on his heels, visibly forcing himself to remain calm as he noticed Harry again. He then, watching Harry, said:

“Fine, but I will pick his tutors and arrange for his schooling outside of Hogwarts. You will not interfere with any of it, and will not be hindering our schedules.”

“His secret—”

“His secrets will be protected, there are vows and oaths of a thousand types—”

“What about—”

“Lily!” Uncle Tony snapped, his voice loud enough to startle Harry - especially as the man was still facing him. “Harry will go to Hogwarts, I’ve accepted that. But I will _not_ allow you to hold back the only living necromancer. I will arrange for additional schooling as I see fit, and you will just have to accept it.”

Harry looked past his godfather, at his mother. The woman had her face pressed against James’s shoulder, and she didn’t respond. Harry wanted her to say something - anything, really - but she didn’t.

She never did, anymore.

*

“Harry!”

The late morning of his birthday found Harry sitting on the roof of Mordred’s Mend, leaning against the chimney, watching the endless sea of dark treetops. He had sneaked there through a window he had dared to open in the attic, vowing to make sure he’d close it on the way back. He just… he couldn’t remain inside. Not when his mother had somehow remembered what day it was today, and was looking for him.

James was still wobbling behind her, falling apart more and more every day. Harry knew that he’d have to learn how to keep the dead things he brought back from falling apart over time, but who to ask? Where to look? His parents had tried to collect any book that would be useful in understanding necromancy, but most of the little that had been published was little more than theoretical speculation of magic thought to be extinct.

Uncle Tony had promised to help, but he had also said that there was quite a bit that Harry would just have to learn on his own. Harry hadn’t discussed the issue further - it was difficult to talk about things his godfather didn’t wish to talk about - but suspected that there was a lot that Uncle Tony wasn’t telling him.

“Harry, where are you?”

Harry huddled closer to the chimney when he saw his mother walking outside - the last thing he wanted was for her to see him up there. He watched her, and James, and tried to remember what they had looked like before James had died. They’d both been so… happy, despite where they lived. They’d been strict with many things, but had done their best to balance the darkness of the Woods and the House with their own laughter and life.

Back then Uncle Tony’s visits had been different, too. He’d first spend time with Harry’s parents, discussing some papers and books and things Harry didn’t understand. Back then Harry had wondered why it was that Uncle Tony was his godfather when he didn’t appear to be a close friend of either of Harry’s parents, but… well… the Potters didn’t have many friends. Harry had never met anyone else - he’d met none of the few people his parents had told him they would visit sometimes. In the end there wasn’t much else Harry could do but accept the situation as it was - Uncle Tony was nice to him, and that was good enough.

“Lily!”

Ah. Speak of the devil. Though, to be fair to this particular devil striding towards Lily, it wasn’t unusual for Uncle Tony to come as early as he could on Harry’s birthday. Lily, ankle-deep in a puddle of something, turned to wave at the wizard approaching her.

“We’re looking for Harry,” she said, voice just barely loud enough for Harry to hear her from his hiding place, even when carried up to his ears by the Woods. “It’s his birthday.”

“Yes,” Uncle Tony said, voice sharp and impatient. “I saw that he wasn’t in his room. How about you and James spend the day together? I will take Harry to Diagon Alley to enjoy his day there.”

“I really wanted to spend the day with him,” Lily said, rubbing the back of her head with a sudden grimace. “But my head hurts. Would you really do that for him? I could… I could bake a cake. For him.”

“No, no, if you have a headache it might be best to simply rest for now,” Uncle Tony said. “I’ll make sure Harry has some cake while we’re out.”

“But—”

“I insist, Lily.”

“Only this once,” Lily relented with a sigh after a moment of contemplation. “But you have to find him first. I don’t think he went into the forest - he knows better than to trust the trees.”

Up on the roof, Harry watched as his parents began making their way towards their - his, too - home again. As soon as he heard the front door swing shut, he slid down the tilted roof, dangling his feet over the edge, before taking a hold of a branch nearby and swinging himself safely back onto solid ground. His mother didn’t trust the trees, but Harry knew that the Woods weren’t that simple.

“Uncle Tony,” Harry called, running towards his godfather. The man spun around and seemed to let out a breath of relief when he saw Harry.

“Your mother was looking for you,” Uncle Tony said, pulling Harry closer when the boy reached him. “Are you well?”

“Yes?”

“You turn ten today,” Uncle Tony said, as if Harry didn’t know that. “I need you to listen to me carefully, and make sure you understand and remember what I’m about to tell you, can you do that?”

Harry nodded. He wasn’t sure if he’d be actually able to understand everything, but how could he predict that when he didn’t know what Uncle Tony wanted to tell him in the first place?

“Today I will take you to meet two friends of mine,” Uncle Tony said, kneeling in front of Harry to maintain eye-contact. “You cannot tell you mother anything of what will happen today - she would not understand. But allowing you to continue to live like this, with capabilities left unrealized, is a waste of great magic.”

“Does… is this about dad?” Harry asked, hesitantly. “I won’t tell mum.”

“Partly,” Uncle Tony replied. “But mostly it is about this talent that you have - this talent that you would have regardless of whether or not you’d have chosen to bring your father back. You have a splendid gift, but for it to serve you well in life, you need to learn things ordinary schools cannot teach you. Do you understand me so far?”

“Yes.”

“Unfortunately your mother does not quite understand that,” Uncle Tony continued. “And she has decided that when your formal schooling begins next year, you will be attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. They will not teach you anything about necromancy there.”

Necromancy. A word that Harry rarely used himself, but felt comforted by whenever he encountered it. Necromancy. That was his thing. He may not have two good parents or a safe place to rest in like other people in books did, but he had _something_ , and that something was _necromancy_ , and it was all _his_.

“Necromancers, as you know, are incredibly rare throughout history,” Uncle Tony continued. “There are none alive today who could teach you the secrets that you will have to discover on your own. However, the two people I will introduce you to today have researched the subject in question extensively, and have thus acquired a vast theoretical knowledge of it.”

“Okay.” What else was there for Harry to say? “They will teach me? Here?”

“They will teach you,” Uncle Tony confirmed, “but not here. All your lessons will be held in my home, Hillcrest. After your meeting with them today - if they decide to agree to teaching you - we will discuss an upcoming schedule. But that will mean that you must learn how to take care of yourself while you’re here, do you understand? You must shower every day, eat every day, sleep through the night. Otherwise you will not have the energy to learn well.”

“All right,” Harry said, feeling partly nervous, partly excited. He wasn’t sure if he could really do anything about the sleeping part, but showering and eating? He could do that. He’d even done that today, even scrubbing behind his ears and drying his hair with a towel rather than just letting it dry on its own. “I promise I’ll do that.”

“Good,” Uncle Tony said, before standing up. “Let’s go, then. The sooner we leave, the better.”

*

Miles east of Khoseda-Khardsky was Hillcrest.

The sprawling fortress had belonged to the Dolohov lineage for centuries, hosting Russia’s finest throughout the times. It was more of a fortress, really, and despite how large it was Harry couldn’t for the life of him remember encountering anyone else but his godfather there.

Not that he had been to Hillcrest often. Even when his parents had been both present, he had rarely been allowed out of Mordred’s Mend, easily spending years never stepping a foot into another place. He had certainly never visited his godfather’s residence enough to get used to the large, dark place with its warm torches and wooden walls.

“This way,” Uncle Tony said, walking ahead. Harry hurried after the man, almost running to keep up with his long strides and they headed down a hallway. Its walls were painted red, with flashes of gold here and here. Above his head Harry could see figures of strange creatures etched into the ceiling, their little twisted faces looking down at them. “This is my office,” Uncle Tony said, pushing a door open and gesturing for Harry to follow him in. “I don’t expect you to remember it. Sit down and don’t touch anything.”

“Yes,” Harry said, and did as told. He sat on a beautiful, uncomfortable chair with curled legs and armrests, and tried to will his nervousness away. To distract himself, he looked up and down, and left and right at the room that seemed somehow… _different_ from what Harry had expected. There were papers, books, oddly shaped quills and some objects the boy couldn’t even recognize. Mostly there were maps, though. Maps and maps and even more maps. New and old, big and small, drawn on paper, etched on stone, woven into fabric and into air itself, floating figures like clouds of dust everywhere.

It was _fascinating_.

So focused on his little observations he was, that Harry didn’t notice his godfather watching him. The sharp grey eyes took in the boy’s sickly pale complexion, his clean but clearly barely brushed hair, and robes that were woefully mismatched. It was clear that while the boy hadn’t been left entirely to his own devices - not with the house-elves providing him with some functions of normalcy - there was no one to help him further than that.

Unfortunate for the boy, but the benefits of not needing to deal with his parents were appreciated.

Antonin Dolohov didn’t care for the boy’s parents, but he did have a place in his heart for his strange little godson. And it what that place that flooded with apprehension as he thought of the people he would have to introduce Harry to. It was necessary - allowing the gift of necromancy to remain unharnessed would be a blasphemy - and yet…

Association with those people would cast Harry into a lifestyle the boy would likely never understand. Unlike other pureblood children, Antonin knew that Harry had been kept away from political discussions of all kinds, knowing only the barest of versions of how the First Wizarding War had ended with the fall of the Dark Lord and the survival of the Longbottoms. He didn’t grow up knowing how their kind hand been wronged and how their power had been chipped away bit by bit.

But most importantly, perhaps, Harry wouldn’t know that this association would inevitably lead him towards a dangerous career full of pain and horror on his end, and fear and respect on everybody else’s. If he reached maturity uninterrupted, no one would dare to oppose him, and he’d serve the Dark Lord as a Death Eater unlike any other.

Until then—

“Dolohov.”

The voice that broke the silence in the office was dry and low, like a hiss, yet it chilled Harry to his very bones. He twisted on the chair, expecting to see an evil creature of some kind, but was surprised – all he could see was a man whose appearance showed nothing that justified the wariness he inspired. The expression on his calm face spoke of some underlying amusement that seemed to be somehow etched into it. His round eyes were an odd mix of grey and gold, the thick-rimmed glasses doing nothing to hide them. His hair, beard, and mustache could have been once black, but were now a darker shade of grey.

“Nott,” Antonin said. “Welcome.”

Nott nodded slowly, moving from the doorway to take a seat on the chair right next to Harry. He then looked at the boy intently, before nodding again. “I didn’t know the necromancer you spoke of would be so young,” Nott said. “How old are you, boy?”

“Ten,” Harry replied. “Turned today.”

A smile – normal in appearance yet somehow terrifying – flashed across Nott’s face, making Harry think of the shadows that ran past open doorways back home sometimes. “Never give more information than what’s asked for,” Nott said then. “Dolohov… I have a son his age at home, and Theodore is a loud, brash child who wouldn’t be able to sit quietly through a lesson even if he were dead – no pun intended.”

“He’s focused,” Antonin replied. “Though I’m surprised you’d even consider allowing a necromancer slip from your fingers like this.”

“I need a proof of his powers,” Nott shot back. “I don’t know what he’s capable of, do I? What has he done to convince you?”

“Plenty since infancy,” Antonin said. “But— his father died a few months ago.”

“Ah, yes. Potter and the unfortunate accident. How dreadfully tragic, I suppose.”

“The boy brought his father back,” Antonin then said. Nott startled, his round eyes becoming even rounder, now gaining a gleam of something unsettling. “Brought him back well enough that his mother thinks the man never died.” Harry noticed that his godfather didn’t mention that Lily wasn’t in any condition to make logical conclusions, and that Harry’s revival of James was truly far from perfect.

“A grown man’s body for an entire week?” Nott murmured, another smile making an appearance. “How extraordinary. What else can he do?”

“You will find that out eventually,” Antonin replied, sounding smug now. “So, interested?”

“Very,” Nott admitted, before turning back to Harry. “Tell me, boy, what do you know of necromancy?”

Harry frowned. _What did he know?_ Well, he knew instinctively how to make his father move. He knew what he’d read about what necromancy _was_. He didn’t know if the other things – portraits and house-elves fleeing in fear at the sight of him – had anything to do with it.

Explaining that seemed to tell Nott enough, and the man muttered something under his breath, before speaking again to Antonin. “I can teach him _about_ necromancy, its history and theories as much as I myself know,” Nott said. “But that… other thing with the house-elves and portraits? I know nothing of that.”

“For that we have someone else,” Antonin said. “Someone who’ll be here soon enough. Harry, this is Ellis Nott. He’ll be one of your teachers.”

Harry nodded, unsure if he was expected to say anything. He knew – he wasn’t sure how, but he could tell – that Ellis Nott was not like him. Maybe he _knew_ things, but he couldn’t do the things Harry did. Then again… nothing out there was like him. The Woods weren’t like him, the House wasn’t like him. Ellis Nott wasn’t like him, and most probably the other teacher wasn’t like Harry either.

But if his godfather so desired, he could sit through whatever lessons these were going to be. And maybe – just maybe – he would learn something useful after all.

*

Harry’s other teacher was a woman like the Woods.

Her eyes were wide and dark, pale face framed by wild black curls, red lips pursed into a pout. She walked like his lullabies flowed, and she saw him like no one else had. Harry stared at her, a melody teasing his mind with every step she took closer.

“Lestrange,” Uncle Tony said, the tone of his voice enough of a warning for now. The woman – _Lestrange_ – let out a bark of a laugh, before sitting down on Harry’s other side.

“I wasn’t aware Nott would be here,” she said, her voice higher than Harry had expected.

“Harry,” Uncle Tony said. “This is Bellatrix Lestrange, she—”

“Call me Bella.”

“—will teach you alongside Nott and I. We will create a schedule for you to follow carefully, with plenty of materials for you to study.”

“The Dark Lord will be pleased,” Lestrange said suddenly, reaching to pet Harry’s hair. “A necromancer! You’ve outdone yourself this time, Dolohov.”

“The Potters were a neutral family,” Nott said. Harry felt strange hearing his family being referred to as _The Potters_. “There’s no guarantee—”

“No necromancer could be neutral,” Lestrange sneered. “Especially if we teach him the things he needs to know. The Dark Lord will be pleased to have him. After all— who would stand against a necromancer? Longbottom? I think not!”

“You’re way ahead of reality now,” Nott told her. “Keep in mind that while _being_ a necromancer is not illegal, in dear England _practicing_ necromancy certainly is. Thanks to the fools fascinated by inferi, we’ll need to have those laws repealed first before we go touting the boy around.”

“You’ve both taken a vow of secrecy,” Uncle Tony said, and Harry, who didn’t quite understand the exchange between Nott and Lestrange, felt relieved when he knew what that meant, at least. “The longer Harry’s abilities are kept secret, the better. Meanwhile we will make sure all of his practicing will be done here in Russia – consider it a loophole of sorts, if you must. I’ll also need someone to teach him the etiquette his parents never cared much about.”

“I’ll find someone,” Nott promised.

 _‘Why would I need to know etiquette?’_ Harry wondered, remaining quiet as the others continued discussing some sort of a schedule for him. _‘Where would I need etiquette?’_ Of what his parents had told him about Hogwarts – and the Gryffindor House in particular – etiquette had never really been mentioned. They’d spoken to him about Quidditch and the library and lessons and the Hospital Wing, but never about _etiquette_. Had things truly changed?

“You’re absolutely sure his mother won’t interfere?” Nott asked, eyeing the schedule they had drafted. “Mondays and Wednesdays with me, Tuesdays and Thursdays with Lestrange, Fridays for etiquette and Saturdays with you. How will you explain his sudden absences when they’re this noticeable?”

“You needn’t concern yourself with that,” Uncle Tony said. “The boy will be better off kept busy anyway.”

“Our Lord will be so pleased,” Lestrange hummed, clearly delighted.

“You need to be careful with saying things like that,” Nott told her. “You _barely_ evaded a sentence in Azkaban after the first war ended. You don’t need to give Aurors reasons to look your way again.”

“They’re looking anyway,” Lestrange sneered in response. “Let them look! Their clocks are ticking and their time is running out whether they know it or not.”

Harry didn’t know what exactly was being discussed now. He was growing bored and restless, but he didn’t dare to shift in his seat or relax – he didn’t know, after all, what Uncle Tony would think of that after having specifically told Harry to remain focused. What if his godfather wanted to ask him questions about this encounter afterwards? The last thing Harry wanted to do was disappoint him.

He did know of this Dark Lord that Lestrange kept bringing up. Voldemort. Harry was familiar with the story of how the First Wizarding War had ended, and how terrifying Voldemort had been. He hadn’t known that there were still people supporting that wizard, but clearly there were.

“We’ll begin starting from next Monday,” Uncle Tony said, now looking at Harry, making the boy straighten up and listen again. “Harry, you’ll be Flooing here on your own for your first lesson.”

“Yes,” Harry replied, not knowing what else to say. Lestrange had turned to look at him as well, leaning closer and closer. Her breath smelled like candy when she spoke:

“Little baby necromancer,” Lestrange cooed. “You’ll be absolutely wonderful, won’t you? Auntie Bella will teach you exciting things to show off at school.”

“He won’t be showing off to anyone,” Uncle Tony said. “The whole _point_ is to teach him as much as possible before anyone catches on to what’s happening. Because the moment Dumbledore or one of his pesky little lions hear a peep of what Harry here can do, you best believe they will interfere.”

“They can _try_ ,” Lestrange replied, rolling her eyes. “I’m not afraid of that old bastard. Remember, baby necromancer, don’t trust anyone at Hogwarts. It’s a bad, bad place for people like us.”

‘Us’ couldn’t have meant necromancers, as Lestrange wasn’t one. It left Harry confused as to what other ‘us’ he was being drawn into. “Okay,” was all he said instead.

“Well, if we’re done here for today,” Nott said, “I’ll take my leave. Potter – I’ll see you on Monday. Dolohov… we’ll keep in touch.”

Harry didn’t know what to expect, and he wasn’t sure if he had understood correctly, but if he would truly be able to leave Mordred’s Mend almost every day, he was willing to put as much effort as needed into learning the things these people wanted to teach him. After all — while they didn’t appear to be nice people, they didn’t seem particularly terrible either.

And Harry, who knew what _terrible_ looked like, was grateful.

*

By Monday, James was missing both of his arms, large patches of his grey skin, and there seemed to be some sort of... green infestation growing across his body. Not that Lily noticed anything, if the sounds coming from the master bedroom were an indication. Often Harry wondered what was it exactly that his mother saw when she looked at James. Then he shuddered and was glad that he didn’t share the misled sight, before opting to decisively not think about his father. It was... too confusing. Complicated. Tough.

 _Nauseating_.

Harry hated nausea more than pain. Pain he could put up with, pain he could control and ignore. But nausea? It turned his insides and scrambled his head, making him too weak to even move. It made him stumble and lose awareness of what was surrounding him. It made him vulnerable, and _that_ — that wasn’t safe in this House.

Uncle Tony had, for some reason, come on Sunday to disconnect the fireplace indoors from the Floo Network, choosing to activate the fireplace outdoor. Harry didn’t think his godfather had discussed this with Lily before doing it, but didn’t dare to ask why. He simply accepted it, dreading already the thought of needing to go outside at night if he wanted to go anywhere late.

Trembling house-elves prepared a bath for Harry, and the boy made sure to brush his hair twice more carefully than before, and wear the clothes his godfather had told the house-elves to set out for him. Nott cared about appearances, Uncle Tony had told him, and Harry didn’t wish to upset his new teacher before the first lesson.

At noon he was ready to leave. He left the house, walking the few steps from the front door to the fireplace, and carefully avoided looking too deep into the Woods. He clutched his bag tightly against his chest, and Flooed to Hillcrest.

“Early.”

Harry startled when he heard Nott’s voice the moment he stepped out of the fireplace. He saw the man standing a few steps away, dressed in robes so dark it was hard to tell their colours. His round eyes were fixed on Harry, before the man gestured for him to follow. And Harry did.

“This will be where our lessons are held,” Nott said, leading Harry to a small study. “I’m eager to see what you’re capable of, baby Potter. So why don’t you start by telling me in greater detail than before - what is it that you know about necromancy?”

“Yes, Mr. Nott,” Harry muttered, sitting down. “Um… the books say it’s a rare type of Dark magic. They say it’s all about bringing back the dead, but not much else.”

“Dreadfully lacking in knowledge, I see,” Nott said, sounding amused. “Necromancy isn’t just Dark - it’s Black Magic. Illegal in most countries, though there are ways around that. Now… there is a popular misconception that necromancy is a question of resurrection. That’s not quite it, as I’m sure you’ve realized. You can animate the body all you want, but the dead will not return.”

Harry thought of James, his breaking body a rotten shell that could barely hobble after Lily anymore. What would his mother do when his father’s corpse had fallen apart too much for it to function? Would she finally snap out of her misery and come back? Or was she going to sink deeper into her delusions and just… forget all about Harry?

“The illusion of controlling the souls of the dead comes actually from few _spectacular_ spells necromancers use – but we will get to that part later. Currently, from what I’ve understood after asking Dolohov more about your… living conditions, what you’re using to animate your father is instinctive - it’s crude, undignified, and _ugly_ necromancy.”

Harry remained silent, though the words stung a bit. His necromancy wasn’t _ugly_.

“I’m not saying that it’s not impressive,” Mr. Nott continued, as if knowing what Harry was thinking. “Because it is. How did you command it?”

“I don’t know,” Harry replied quietly. “Mom was screaming and I wanted her to stop. But she didn’t. So I hoped that dad would wake up so she would be happy again, and... he... did. Partly.”

“You didn’t say anything to it?” Mr. Nott asked carefully. “Anything at all?”

“No,” Harry confirmed, remembering with clarity that there had been no words involved – only a desperate wish. “Nothing.”

“Usually necromancy needs a spell-soaked order to work,” Mr. Nott said. “It seems that I have my work cut out for me. You’re terribly uneducated, Potter, so make up for it with attention and focus. The proper act of necromancy needs an activation-word and a deactivation-word. The first will keep your powers from manifesting uncontrollably no matter the situation – if someone, for example, held you under the Imperius curse, they will need to be able to know the activation word to order you to use your powers. Needless to say, the word in question is best to be kept a secret.”

“What about the deactivation word?” Harry asked, deciding to look up what in the world the Imperius curse was – he had never heard of it before, and it sounded terrible already.

“That is to ensure the continuation of your control even if you happen to fall unconscious. For example you’re in a battle and you have a few corpses guarding something important. Then you get knocked out. If the deactivation spell has not been said, the corpses will keep guarding their treasure.”

Harry nodded, hoping that Nott would be able to teach him more than just the theory of these activation and deactivation words. He hadn’t needed any before, so… how could he apply them now, belatedly?

“That is physical necromancy,” Nott said. “There is also spiritual necromancy, that calls the spirits of the dead. It’s… advanced and harder to control. It can easily lead to terrible, lasting haunting. Magnus Malfoy from the fifteen-hundreds notoriously died after a lasting haunting had driven him to suicide.”

“I have a question,” Harry said. “If I can re-animate the body, and summon the soul… then why can’t I just bring the person back?”

“In theory, it sounds possible,” Nott said dryly. “But how would you attach the soul back to the body? It has never been done before. At any case, you won’t be doing anything with souls until you learn the basics of body preservation at least.”

Harry nodded, and held back a groan when Nott began piling books in front of him. The man was clearly knowledgeable and eager to teach him about history and the theories relating to necromancy, and the more questions Harry asked, the more pleasant he appeared to become. Harry didn’t _mind_ learning from him, but wondered if he’d be always stuck reading chapters aloud and discussing them rather than _doing_ something.

The lesson with Nott was draining, but interesting.

And yet… it was Bellatrix whose input made Harry feel alive.

*

_come little children_

_i'll take thee away, into a land_

_of enchantment_

_come little children_

_the time's come to play_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lullabies in this chapter = not by me! The first one is an old Russian lullaby called "Bayu Bayushki Bayu". The second one is "Come Little Children" from Hocus Pocus.
> 
> Anyway. Slowburn Drarry. Is it a romcom or a horror story? Who the fuck knows.


	2. Leave Naught Behind (But Heartache and Cold)

Despite what Uncle Tony had ordered, Bella took Harry away from their designated study the moment the two of them were left alone. She hushed him, then pulled him along through corridors Harry wouldn’t know how to navigate on his own. Their footsteps were quiet, and yet Harry knew that they could be heard – or would have been heard, had Hillcrest been anything like the House. It wasn’t, and so they kept walking undisturbed, until they reached what appeared to be a chapel within the premises.

Harry hadn’t ever been to a chapel before, but he’d seen pictures.

Bellatrix – who had told him twice to call her Bella, but Harry simply couldn’t – led him through the chapel, letting out a cackle as she walked past the seats and towards a large door in the back. Harry ran after her, seeing no one else but _knowing_ that the rows weren’t empty. The walls themselves were listening to him, and he didn’t want to know what this place would do to him if he was left alone.

“Here,” Bellatrix said suddenly. Harry looked at her first, before taking a look at the room they were now in - it wasn’t special by any means. There was a table with a large box on it. The walls were stained and white, the floor was wooden and creaky.

“Don’t look down, baby necromancer,” Bellatrix cooed. “What’s down will look up, and you won’t like that.”

“Okay,” Harry replied, trying to not think too much of what _that_ meant. Were all the people Uncle Tony knew so _strange_?

“When the Dark Lord walked among us,” the woman said, “he commanded magic unlike anything you could imagine. He could raise an army of inferi with a single thought, and yield powers that surpassed death itself.”

Harry was careful to not show any of his scepticism. The barely contained anger that oozed out of Bellatrix wouldn’t be tolerant of disagreements - especially disagreements concerning her precious Dark Lord. Harry was certain of that, and he didn’t want to test it. She reminded him of the Woods. Their silent and dark hunger, barely containing itself within its physical boundaries, ready to lash out and devour anything it could reach.

It was… scary.

It felt _good_.

“Our Lord never wasted time hesitating,” Bellatrix continued. “I expect that of you as well - unrestrained effort, baby necromancer. The moment you hesitate, I’ll drop you into a well so deep and dark you won’t be able to climb your way out of it, and leave you there to rot. Don’t think I won’t. Even Dolohov wouldn’t be able to find you.”

“Okay,” Harry said again, not doubting her. He wasn’t sure what absence of hesitation really was, though, and it worried him a little. What if he just wasn’t good enough? He didn’t want to end up in a well somewhere - especially considering that aside from Uncle Tony, it wasn’t as if anyone else would actually search for him.

His mum certainly wouldn’t.

“Close your eyes and kneel down,” Bellatrix said then. When Harry did, he could’ve _sworn_ he felt fingertips grazing his knees through the floorboards. “Keep your eyes closed. Take deep breaths, and describe everything around you to me.”

 _‘Don’t hesitate,’_ Harry thought, forcing himself to bypass the moments of contemplation during which he would’ve thought of any underlying meanings or missions. Instead he simply did what Bellatrix asked of him: describe everything he felt, heard, and smelled. And when he ran out of the obvious things - the cold air, the sounds of her breathing and the wind outside, his own discomfort - he latched onto the stream of thoughts he had lost control of.

“There’s someone under the floorboards,” Harry said, his heart beating fast. “There’s someone else by the door. And a woman in the box. There’s a _woman_ in the _box_.” He felt scared - of the things he was describing, of Bellatrix, of being _here_ with her.

He was scared.

He didn’t know when the words tumbling out of his mouth changed. When _there’s a woman in the box_ and _a man by the doorway_ and _someone’s hanging from the ceiling_ changed into a familiar, comforting lullaby of _bayu bayushki bayu_ —

“Enough.” Bellatrix’s voice brought him crashing back, and as Harry blinked his eyes open, he saw her right in front of him, with barely two steps between them. The woman was looking at him with wide, _wide_ eyes, though there were no indications of surprise or disapproval or— or _anything_ \- to be found on her face.

 _‘There’s a woman in the box,’_ Harry thought, now paying attention to the large box that had been in the room before them. From the corner of his eye he could see that the doorway was empty. Similarly, there was no one hanging from the ceiling.

Bellatrix kneeled in front of him, to get to his eyelevel. She then poked the corners of his eyes with her sharp nails and said: “don’t trust these.”

_‘Don’t trust my eyes?’_

“These don’t notice everything you need to be aware of,” Bellatrix continued, her red mouth twisting into a grin. “You’re right,” she whispered. “There’s a woman in the box. And a man by the door. And another hanging from the ceiling. I can’t see them anymore, but I know they’re there - I was here when their bodies were put up to dry.”

_‘What does that mean?’_

“Nott must’ve told you,” the woman said. “There’s more to necromancy than raising the dead. It’s a whole different world. It’s a world you’ll need to hear and taste, and your eyes will only burden you. What you did here, now - do it _everywhere_. Every moment you can. Every moment you stand still. Close your eyes and open yourself up to that world.”

“Is that what you do?” Harry asked, the question slipping out without much thought. Bellatrix pulled back and let out an actual _growl_.

“No,” she snapped. “No, _I_ can’t. Even if I did - if anyone else did, if Dolohov did, if Nott did - we wouldn’t notice the things you do. Because we’re not part of that world the way you are.”

 _‘What is that world?’_ Harry thought then, but didn’t dare to voice that question. Bellatrix spoke as if him being able to revive - in some meaning of the word - his father made him part of another world altogether, which was just… absurd. “Okay,” he ended up saying in the end.

Bellatrix didn’t look like she expected any other answer. Instead, she led him to another part of Hillcrest, and had him do it all over again.

*

Harry Potter was… a strange creature.

Ellis Nott found odd creatures to be infinitely worthier of his time than many others. He didn’t find the boy particularly bright, but at least he was willing to read and learn and keep trying. He asked questions, but didn’t seem to quite grasp his own situation, or the importance of the people who had agreed to teach him. Regardless, he was respectful and quiet, always on time, always with his homework carefully completed.

It was Harry he was thinking of when in early February, while attending some celebration or another held by the Malfoys, Ellis saw his son talking with Lucius’s spawn. Sheltered children inspired a bone-deep repulsion in him, and his blood itched to wake those little bags of flesh to the cruel reality of existence. He should’ve raised his Theo the way baby Potter had apparently been raised - aware of death, if not of evil in this world. His wife had, unfortunately, taken the lead in raising the boy, and by now Ellis simply didn’t have the desire to invest that energy into Theo.

“A sickle for your thoughts?” Dolohov said, appearing out of nowhere. Ellis shrugged.

“I recall the parties held a decade ago to have been much more crowded,” he replied, accepting the glass of wine Dolohov handed him. The other man nodded.

“We lost the first time around,” he said. “I barely got unscathed, and he fact that the Lestranges and the Malfoys are still free is nothing short of a miracle.”

“I know,” Ellis muttered. “But, as you said, that was the first round. The Dark Lord’s return is a matter of time - our Dark Marks are still visible. Every single Death Eater should know that his absence is temporary, and yet— so many have extracted themselves from the good company.”

“Surely you didn’t expect the likes of Snape to stick around,” Dolohov sneered.

“That slippery fuck,” Ellis said. “He’ll run back when the Dark Lord rises. And we’ll get our pound of flesh out of him then. And in the meanwhile, we simply wait.”

“Well,” Dolohov drawled, “we’re not _that_ limited with out options. Snape _hated_ the Potters, and I’m sure we’ll be able to figure out a way to use Harry to torment that fucker a bit.”

“Speaking of,” Ellis said. “Harry.”

“What about him?”

“He’s been keeping busy, hasn’t he?”

“He’s got a lot to learn,” Dolohov said dismissively. “Even his etiquette teacher - I got him the woman you recommended - has her hands full with trying to drill everything necessary into him as fast as possible, and it’s been _months_ already since we all started teaching him. The boy has had virtually no guidance in how to behave around others prior to his lessons, and that’s been the case since long before James Potter died.”

“That’s a unique approach by his parents,” Ellis said. “Though I’d like to suggest including regular therapy in his pre-Hogwarts curriculum.”

“A _therapist_ ,” Dolohov repeated mockingly, rolling his eyes. “Fuck off.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Ellis hissed. “If you want him to pull through in the long run and not end up like Bellatrix toeing the line of lunacy, you’ll have to train his mind where you train his magic and body as well. His living conditions are atrocious - are you _honestly_ telling me that you don’t see how that would affect his psyche?”

Ellis saw Dolohov’s expression souring, and eventually the man shrugged. Ellis continued: “That boy has been living for almost half a year with his rotting father and his insane mother - whose conduct, let me remind you, is _vile_. How he hasn’t lost his mind yet is a mystery.”

“He’s a necromancer,” Dolohov said. “They experience the world differently.”

“Wrong,” Ellis shot back. “As a necromancer he’ll need a balanced mind even more than the average person. Training a child’s endurance and ridding him of naivety is different from making him live a traumatizing childhood that could fracture his mind and leave him open and vulnerable to any attacks.”

“Harry acts normal. He does occasionally have nightmares, but who doesn’t?”

“Most children of that age do _not_ have reoccurring nightmares, you— you _fool_. He cannot reach his full potential when he’s constantly distracted by a multitude of horrors _you_ wouldn’t be able to live with. The most common expression he has on his dumb little face is that of confusion. He’s startled too easily, he’s fatigued and has clear signs of exhaustion. His physical health is bad, he’s too thin and too pale and too fragile. He has difficulties concentrating. He’s anxious and afraid, withdrawn to the point of – for fuck’s sake, Dolohov, the boy is a hermit! Does he even talk to anyone but us?”

“Why would he need a therapist, then?” Dolohov asked. “If it’s a matter of him finding more people to talk with, why not just introduce him to your kid and the blond brat with him?”

“Because they’d eat him alive, those spineless, self-absorbed fools. At this point it would only traumatize your godson more. Potter will need some careful teaching and counselling before we can let him interact with people who will just trample over him. Seriously, if he went like _this_ to Hogwarts, it would be a disaster waiting to happen. You don’t need to understand, Dolohov, but you do need to accept. You trusted me with his education – do you really think that I’d do something to harm him now?”

“ _Fine_ ,” Dolohov relented reluctantly. “A therapist. I’ll look through the hospitals in Russia for a—“

“A British pureblood and nothing less,” Ellis interrupted. “Someone certified from St. Mungo’s.”

“You have someone already in mind?”

“I do.”

“Some fool who’s already in your pocket?” Dolohov sneered. “They better have a thick skin and be able to handle the things a necromancer - no matter how inexperienced that necromancer is - will tell them. It’s only going to get worse as he grows up.”

“You don’t need to worry,” Ellis said. “You know him. It’s Caspar Crabbe. If there’s anyone who could handle it, it’ll be him.”

“And if he doesn’t?”

“Well. People die all the time, don’t they?”

*

_There was a bird on the branch right outside Harry’s window._

Harry stared at it, unused to seeing creatures from the Woods come this close to the House. He had been watching his mother wander outside, wary of the setting sun and what that would mean for them. He’d have to get her back indoors before dark, or he wouldn’t be getting her back at all.

Perhaps it was all the time he spent now away from Lily - now months of meeting Ellis and Bellatrix for his lessons twice a week, and then meeting Mrs. Goyle for etiquette, and his Uncle Tony once a week each - but he had become more aware than ever of the state his mother was in. Was that a way to live? Playing pretend with a corpse? Unable to put him to rest and live in a world without him?

Harry couldn’t imagine himself loving anyone that much.

He _wouldn’t_ love anyone that much.

Uncle Tony had sent him an owl earlier today, saying that he’d introduce Harry to a therapist. A therapist! Wasn’t it his mother who needed one and not him? He’d read about therapists too - what would they be able to do anyway? He wasn’t crazy, and no amount of talking to some stranger was going to change the House. Or change Harry.

_The bird shuffled closer on the branch, and Harry knew that if he was fast enough, he could grab it._

He doubted that anything could change his mother either.

James’s body had fallen more and more into pieces, and Harry wasn’t entirely sure what exactly kept the corpse moving even now - its bones clung together, meat all but gone, skin hanging off him like an old suit. It was only a matter of time before the bones would begin breaking as well, and what would Lily do then?

She had to have been aware, on some level, of James’s fragility - she no longer sat on his lap, and there were no longer sounds coming from her bedroom at night. Harry no longer found pieces of his father in the corridor outside his room, and even the pace at which the two walked had slowed down considerably.

That meant - it _must_ have meant - that somewhere deep down, Lily was still there.

_Harry stared at the small bird as it gripped the branch it was sitting on with its tiny feet and—_

She certainly was present enough to argue against Uncle Tony’s constant efforts to convince her to send Harry to Durmstrang instead of Hogwarts. Harry wasn’t sure why Uncle Tony needed Lily’s permission - he certainly never needed it for anything else - but suspected it was just one of those things that would need a guardian’s permission rather than simply a godfather’s.

After all… no one else knew about Lily, did they?

What would happen to Harry if someone found out? Would Harry be sent to live somewhere else, with a family that would just be scared of him, wary of him, and make him feel like an intruder? Because at the end of the day Harry knew that there was - at least for now - no better place for him than the House.

His home was here.

_—his hand lunged forward, almost unaccompanied by thought. He had just… acted. He had acted without hesitation the way Bellatrix had taught him. He had acted without an interruption to his stream of thoughts, and without looking away from his mother’s wandering figure._

He didn’t trust the House. And he knew better than to mistake the Woods for an ally. But at least this place was _his_ , and no one could make him feel like he didn’t belong. He had grown up here, and didn’t have a single memory of the other house his parents said they’d lived in before - somewhere in Godric’s Hollow, apparently. Lily had spoken so highly of the place, and so had James.

And whenever Harry had asked them why they’d come to Mordred’s Mend, then, they’d just… give him a sad little look and change the subject. They never explained it - they never explained anything, really - and so Harry had been forced to just accept the reality as it was, and deal with his curiosities on his own.

 _‘Someday I’ll visit Godric’s Hollow,’_ Harry thought, still watching his mother outside, now circling the fireplace Uncle Tony had connected to the Floo. There was no powder for her to use, however, and so Harry didn’t worry about where she’d end up.

_He didn’t care about the terrified cawing of the bird, its panicked shrieks and batting wings. A sense of urgency led his fingers to curl around the bird’s neck and—_

He would have to call her back soon. Or send a house-elf to collect her. The sun was setting, and it wouldn’t be long until they ran out of time. He didn’t much care about leaving James’s remains out for the night - what could befall someone already long dead? His mother, on the other hand…

What would she see?

Could the Woods fix her? Could _anything_? Harry didn’t think so, but what could be worse than what she was like now anyway? If he just left her out overnight… what would happen? Would Harry open the door for her in the morning? Would he dare to, or would that be allowing the Woods in? Was whatever lurked in there just hiding in the dark, watching and waiting for him to open a door or a window just a minute too early?

Did Uncle Tony know that by disconnecting the fireplace indoors and connecting to the fireplace outside, he had ended up trapping Harry in the House every night? Because Harry was not going to go outside - not for anything.

_—squeeze. Squeeze more, until he finally heard a satisfying—_

Harry clenched his eyes shut and shook his head. He led out a quiet little groan, before blinking his eyes open and forcing the grimace that had taken over his face to disappear.

“Vurney,” Harry said, hating how strange he felt to be speaking out loud in the House, and knowing that the house-elf would hear him even if it didn’t dare to appear. “Bring my mother back in. You can leave James out if he’s not fast enough to follow.”

_—crack._

*

In Hillcrest, Harry was led to his godfather’s study again. Walking through the dark corridors was now more familiar than it had ever been, and he had become quite good at ignoring the things no one else could see or hear either. It was even easier to ignore the empty portrait frames and the disappearing house-elves.

He just… he didn’t understand _why_ they were so scared?

Uncle Tony’s hand was gripping his shoulder so hard it hurt, but Harry didn’t dare to point it out. He knew who’d be waiting for them - not his name or what he looked like, but he knew why he was there, and what the man would be expected to do. Harry didn’t look forward to any of it. He didn’t think he was the one who needed a therapist, anyway.

“This is Caspar Crabbe,” Uncle Tony said, gesturing towards the man waiting for them in Uncle Tony’s office. The first thing Harry noticed was a bright orange tie that did no favours to the puke yellow robes of the wizard greeting them. The man put down a cup of tea he had been holding and nodded his head, his gelled greying blond hair not moving and inch with the motion. His droopy brown eyes were fixed on Harry, and a smile appeared on his unsettlingly wide mouth.

“Hello,” Caspar Crabbe said. His voice much deeper than Harry had expected.

“Healer Crabbe specializes in therapy of the mind,” Uncle Tony said, and from the way Crabbe’s smile twitched, Harry suspected that the description wasn’t quite as accurate as he would’ve wanted. “This is Harry Potter, as I’ve told you. You understand the sensitivity of his case, yes?”

“Of course,” Crabbe replied, eyes still fixed on Harry, making the boy resist the urge to shift nervously or look away. “Has he received a physical health evaluation?”

“Merlin,” Uncle Tony hissed. “Between you and Ellis— fine, yes. He hasn’t yet, but I’ll look into it. Looks healthy to me, though, so I won’t be in a rush to arrange that.”

“You speak freely in front of him?” Crabbe asked, _finally_ turning to look at Uncle Tony. “He understands you, you know.”

“He’s _ten_ ,” Uncle Tony said, as if that explained anything.

“I know you loathe children, but you do realize that he’s fully capable of comprehending what you’re saying even if you don’t talk to him directly?”

“He’s used to this.”

Crabbe fell silent then, staring at Uncle Tony with disbelief. Harry hated to admit that while he _did_ understand what the two were saying, he couldn’t help but feel that there was something in the conversation that he hadn’t grasped. He just… even after all this time, he just wasn’t used to following conversations between other people. He wasn’t used to that.

Harry was startled when Crabbe suddenly gestured at him. “He’s very pale,” the man said. “His posture is _terrible_ —”

“It’s better now than it used to be.”

“He _radiates_ tension and nervous energy.”

“He can channel all that into talking,” Uncle Tony said. “Talking to _you_. That’s why you’re here. Harry - every Friday afternoon, right after your etiquette session with Mrs. Goyle ends, you’ll be spending a few hours talking to Healer Crabbe. He’ll hold the sessions here—”

“No, no,” Crabbe cut in. “In my office, where I have appropriate wards and charms in place to ensure full confidentiality.”

“Nott recommended him,” Uncle Tony told Harry, as if Crabbe hadn’t spoken. “And you seem to like Nott well enough.”

Harry nodded, though he had no idea what had given his godfather _that_ impression. He didn’t mind Ellis Nott, and felt pleased when the man approved of anything he did. He wasn’t sure if that counted as liking him, however. “When will we start?”

“We’ll have a practice run today,” Crabbe said. “An introductory session, really, for you to familiarize yourself with the concept and be able to mentally prepare for the real, longer sessions. Antonin - your fireplace works in this office, right? Harry and I might as well just floo to Highfield Hollow directly from here.”

“Now?” Harry squeaked, feeling completely unprepared and out of his element. He didn’t resist when Crabbe pulled him towards the fireplace, but shot his godfather a worried look. He hadn’t come here expecting to be thrust into a conversation with a stranger.

“Caspar,” Uncle Tony then said, “I don’t need to tell you what will happen if the boy is harmed in any way. I might not much care for children in general, but he’s a bit different.”

“You know what’s funny?” Crabbe asked, though he didn’t sound like he was amused. “Nott told me something similar. He even took it a bit further and showed me using a muggle what would happen, as if he would actually dare. The boy is my patient, and I’ll treat him accordingly. Whatever you and Nott are thinking, I have no interest in playing those games.”

“Keep it that way,” Uncle Tony said. Crabbe almost turned away then, but stopped and said:

“You know… you and Nott keep forgetting that I was a Death Eater too, once. You cannot harm me, no matter what you think.”

“I’d suggest not testing that theory,” Uncle Tony said. “I’d hate for you to become an entirely avoidable casualty.”

Harry was still unsure of what was actually being discussed, and felt grateful when Healer Crabbe handed him the small bowl of Floo Powder. He couldn’t get to the fireplace fast enough, wanting nothing more than to leave the tense atmosphere behind.

Even therapy had to be better than _this_.

*

When Harry arrived, he found himself in a dark room. It didn’t quite look right for a living room - the chairs were scattered, and there were too many tables. There were papers piled here and there, and a vase of water with some treats on a tray by one of the doors. The walls were lined with tall shelves full of books, and the floor was covered in carpets. There were no portraits.

“Well then,” Healer Crabbe said, stepping out of the fireplace behind him. “This is the waiting room. Follow me, I’ll take you to my office instead.”

“We’ll talk in your office?”

“We can go to another room if it doesn’t make you feel comfortable,” Crabbe said. “The lounge or the kitchen, perhaps?”

“No,” Harry replied immediately. Kitchens were no good, he didn’t like kitchens. Lily used to hang out a lot in the kitchen, even after James’s death, and Harry just couldn’t feel comfortable in one. Living rooms were no good either - they were too… too central. “Office is good.”

Healer Crabbe’s office was very different from the ones Harry had seen before. Ellis Nott’s office was neat and organized, full of books and odd objects with whispers all around them, while Uncle Tony’s was kind of messy with its various maps and floating devices that he had never explained or introduced. Healer Crabbe’s office was… well, it was also full of books, but it was large and light. The furntiture was white, and so were the couches and the carpets and the curtains. There were two large windows at the opposite ends of the room, each showing a different landscape, as if peeking into different parts of the world somehow.

“Well then,” Healer Crabbe started, gesturing for Harry to take a seat. “I know this may feel strange or awkward to you - that’s perfectly normal. I don’t think anyone knows how to talk about themselves when they know they’re being listened to. Not right away anyway.”

Harry shrugged.

“I’m Caspar Crabbe,” the man said, as if he hadn’t been introduced already. “I’m a Healer at St. Mungo’s, where I work most of the time as a psychotherapist. I specialize in long-term treatment of children, teens, and young adults from alternative family backgrounds.”

“What does that mean?” Harry asked, head spinning. He didn’t want Healer Crabbe to think he was dumb, but he didn’t understand most of the things the man had just talked about.

“What it means,” Healer Crabbe said, and luckily he didn’t seem to be upset by Harry’s question, “is that the discussions you and I will have, are discussions with an objective. While your godfather made it appear as if you’ll be simply sharing your secrets into a void that then just swallows them and leaves them to crumble into dust, that is not at all what this is about. As you’re growing up - and already now - the things you’re capable of and the way you have been raised so far have contributed to isolating you. And when you’re thrust into various social situations - especially those that involved a large group of people - you might end up feeling confused, overwhelmed, and anxious.”

That… that sounded pretty accurate. Harry had already felt all that when he’d first met Ellis and Bellatrix.

“All that is normal for someone with your background,” Healer Crabbe continued. “However, it being normal doesn’t mean that you can’t change it or overcome it. And that is where our discussions come into play. We can start this session slowly, test the waters, and see how you feel about it. Nothing you say in this room will ever be repeated to anyone else outside of it, including your godfather.”

“Okay,” said Harry. He hadn’t worried about telling Uncle Tony, and didn’t know if it mattered, really.

“How about you tell me a bit about yourself,” Healer Crabbe then said. “Say anything that comes to mind, and do not worry over how you’re saying it. Like I said - anything you say here will remain a secret.”

“Okay,” said Harry again. He thought about what he’d like to share about himself, and thought about Bellatrix’s aggressive and hostile resentment towards hesitation, and said: “I’m… I’m Harry?”

What else? He could say he was a necromancer, but everyone seemed to care about it so much more than he did. He could also say he was a Potter, but not only did Crabbe already know that, but Harry didn’t _feel_ like a Potter. He didn’t feel like anything resembling his dad.

“Just Harry,” Harry said. “I’m ten.”

And then: “I don’t know what else to say.”

Crabbe nodded, looking pleased already, though Harry didn’t think he’d said anything for the man to be happy about. “Good,” Crabbe said. “Your godfather told me you study a lot. How have those lessons been?”

“They’re… okay,” Harry said. “I like them. It’s something to do, at least. I get bored sometimes when I’m home.”

“Who else is with you there?” Crabbe asked. Harry wasn’t sure if the man knew the answer, but, well… he _had_ encouraged Harry to speak openly, hadn’t he?

“Mum’s there,” Harry replied. “She’s alive. Dad’s there too, but he’s been dead for a while. I don’t think he’s going to be moving for much longer.” Harry expected Crabbe to latch on to that, and was relieved when the man didn’t.

“Do you like it at home?” Crabbe asked instead.

“I do. Compared to everywhere else I’ve been, I like home the most.”

“Do you often go someplace else?”

“Not before the lessons started,” Harry explained. “But since then I’ve been to Hillcrest many, many times. And then wherever Ellis Nott or Bellatrix Lestrange want to take me.”

The questions continued. They were easy for Harry to answer, but made him feel all the more nervous because of it. He couldn’t begin to guess what Healer Crabbe thought about him, but at least… at least it was comforting to know that the man wouldn’t be able to share whatever conclusions he got from anywhere else.

But, overall he was nice. Harry liked him.

Well, liked him enough to not tell him about the faces in the ceiling of his office, anyway.


	3. Are We Still Grieving, Mama?

“—and look,” the man said, pointing at the patches of skin still hanging on to the cadaver. “Touch it. The give of the skin is different from the fresh ones, you see? So if you want to keep a body going, you’ll have to nourish it. Just getting it up and running isn’t enough. Now look, this other one - she's _fresh_.”

“But James—”

“You told me that was accidental magic, didn’t you? You didn’t say anything in order to bring him back, and so it’ll be impossible to tell what is actually powering him at the moment. Could be you, or could be any other power source you’ve connected him to unwittingly. This is why it’s so difficult to fix damage caused by accidental magic - you never really _know_ what’s causing it and how.”

The thing about Ellis Nott was that he didn’t _look_ odd. His glasses went a long way in distracting people from his strange eyes, and the way he dressed spoke only subtly of his wealth and status. He wasn’t aggressive, gloomy, or unpleasant, but neither was he chipper or welcoming. His face was often a mask of polite indifference, with a hint of a smile fading in and out of existence. There was nothing alarming about him, and yet—

And yet, he did these _things_ sometimes—

Like how far he’d turn his head before moving his body. Or how hard he’d dig his fingers in through an open wound of whatever body they were observing. The passion with which he spoke of the dead and the dying was almost tangible. And he just… never seemed to run out of friends who just happened to be morticians with fresh corpses conveniently and readily available for them to poke at.

“It’s fascinating,” Nott - who kept telling Harry to call him Ellis and then sneered whenever Harry did so - said. “All these people. How hard they fought to live just a moment longer. Can you hear them scream in agony? Can you taste their very presence in the air?”

Harry couldn’t. The body was dead, and there was nothing in the morgue with them but stale air. Perhaps he could’ve ‘heard them scream’ if he had done that whole meditation thing Bellatrix had taught him, but… Harry didn’t _want_ to hear people scream. There was nothing fun about it. Why would someone else screaming in agony be something anyone would want to hear?

However, speaking of souls— “I have a question?”

“Hmm?” Nott looked at him, though he still maintained his leaning position over the body. “What is it?”

“What’s the matter with ghosts?” Harry asked. He wasn’t sure if he’d need to elaborate, but did so anyway: “How come there are ghosts that everybody can see, but then— I mean, _I_ can see ghosts that you can’t. Why’s that?”

Nott’s eyes widened, and the smile that appeared on his face was larger than Harry had ever seen it before - almost too wide to fit into his face, but that was of course impossible. The man positively glowed, though he still didn’t take a step away from the cadaver when he said: “Excellent observation!”

“A ghost,” Nott continued, “is an imprint of the soul of a once-living wizard or witch. They’re fleshless spirits that linger having made the _choice_ to remain, either out of attachment to a place or something else. And that choice turns them into creatures— and _that_ is why the term ghost is so misleading, though only when someone like _you_ is involved.”

“What… what do you mean?”

“A ghost in the sense that I explained - a ghost like those you’ll encounter at Hogwarts - is no longer human. It is a creature under the categorization of a spirit. It is a different being. What _you_ see are ghosts as well, but much more of an _echo_ than anything else. They never made the choice to remain - they’re _stuck_.”

“And that makes them different?” Harry asked, not entirely convinced.

“In all the ways that matter,” Nott replied. “They want to go but never made it to the other side, and remain invisible to both the living and the dead— except to those like you who toe the line.”

“Can ghosts tell that I’m a necromancer?” Harry asked then, suddenly curious.

“ _Any_ creature can tell that there’s something different about you,” Nott said. “But whether or not they can tell what it is… I suppose it depends on whether they’ve encountered a necromancer before or not, and if they still remember that feeling well enough to identify it now. You’ve noticed how house-elves act around you, haven’t you? And that portraits tend to leave their frames whenever you’re near? There’s something deeply unsettling about you to any creature that is more aware than mere human beings are. Even wizards more attuned to death, such as myself, can tell that there’s something about you that is interesting.”

“But why is that _scary_?” Harry blurted out, frustrated. “What’s so scary about _dying_?”

Nott sighed, his wide smile becoming something smaller, softer. He looked down at the cadaver on the table, fingertips gliding lightly over the contours of its face. “This one was June,” he said out of nowhere. “She feared death just like anyone else, but remains unaware of the fate of her remains now. People fear that loss of awareness - the thought of no longer being a conscious, thinking creature is unbearable, because… of all the things you will no longer have. And the animal desire to survive - to live on and see another day - is powerful.”

“So it’s less about death itself, and more about the things you will lose if you die?” Harry asked, frowning.

“People fear losing things,” Nott replied. “Change is another thing that people fear, as they worry about losing the good things they have now. Death is all those fears realized.”

Harry wasn’t sure if he really understood what was at play here, but also doubted that Nott could give him a better answer than the one he had already received. So he simply nodded, and refocused on the cadaver. He tried to muster up a smile, feeling sorry for the invisible pain of the body on the table.

The cadaver smiled back, its black eyes fixed on Harry.

 _‘Mr. Nott,’_ Harry thought sadly, watching Nott fiddle with the corpse without noticing anything different about it. _‘I don’t think you’re as attuned to death as you think.’_

*

Harry wasn't entirely sure what to expect from his sessions with Bellatrix, the witch never telling him in advance what she had planned. She had started out with meditation a long time ago, and over the span of the months they'd spent, she'd discussed politics and weaponry and even healing with him from time to time. This time, she seemed to have something new and exciting in mind.

"You're still soft, baby necromancer," she cooed, petting his hair gently, though Harry knew better than to take her words as compliments. "Most of that hesitation can be trained away, but it's so hard to do when that ridiculous godfather of yours hasn't even gotten you a practice wand yet. Maybe I should get you one - that'll show him!"

Harry, who hadn't really thought about practice wands before, didn't really care one way or another. Instead he stared at the picture of a man Bellatrix had hung on the wall in front of them. The picture appeared normal in every way - standing still, even, unlike portraits. It resembled the anatomical illustrations that Nott always had around him.

"But with no wand," Bellatrix then said, "we have to improvise." She then let go of him, and with a few steps came to stand right by the picture that, from what Harry could see now, was even taller than her. The man depicted had dark hair and grey eyes, and looked vaguely familiar, somehow.

"Who is he?" Harry asked, frowning.

"No one," Bellatrix replied, before pulling out a knife and using its sharp tip to gesture at the illustration. "I'll show you where to aim your little spells to get the best out of them, baby necromancer. You see - it makes a hell of a difference if your little jinxes hit someone in the leg or the neck. And that difference can really safe your life some day."

"Okay," Harry said, once again not really liking whatever lifestyle Bellatrix was apparently imagining for him. "Thank you."

"And who knows when you'll need to sort someone out with your little fists to avoid compromising your wand," the witch then continued, before digging the tip of the knife into the head of the illustration. "Given the option, always go for the head, baby. So many things you can achieve here: aim for the temple or jaw of a knockout, nose and eyes to confuse their senses, and neck to stop them from talking - or breathing, for that matter. Your problem with this will be, of course, will be your reach. A jinx could go through, so don't discount the head even if you can't physically get to it."

'I wonder what kind of jinxes would actually help me make use of that,' Harry thought. Because surely if he flung a bombarda - one of his godfather's favourites - at someone, it would matter if he hit the nose or the neck, their head would be blown off regardless. Was there a jinx of some sort that was simply a punch? There had to be, right?

"Inner elbows," Bellatrix then continued. "Disable your opponent's arms and prevent them from casting any spells that need finesse of movement. I'd always recommend doing this first, especially with opponents who know more spells that you do."

"Yes," Harry agreed, now more interested than before. He wasn't interested in hitting someone in the head, but if he could stop a fight just by making them temporarily unable to cast spells - would that be great?

"Solar plexus," Bellatrix then said. "Hard to hit, but effective in knocking the wind out of your opponents. Great for cutting curses - aim here to make sure they won't stand up again. The liver is also a good place to take aim at, especially if you wish to cause long-term damage. The groin is excellent for immediate distraction, although if you wish to make them hurt while still leaving them with hope of survival, a cutting curse there too will do a trick - and not just for men, baby."

'Just what was she up to during the war,' Harry thought then, doubting that all this advice was coming from a purely theoretical standpoint. He nodded, doubting that he'd ever have a reason to send a cutting curse at anyone's genitals.

"And then another one of my favourites: the knees," Bellatrix said, now moving the knife lower on the illustration. "Relatively easy to get to - people often forget to protect their legs - yet can throw your opponent off-balance and leave them crawling for safety, unable to attack you or defend themselves against you. They become little more than flies in your spider's web, trying in vain to struggle their way out. Now - questions?"

"None," Harry replied, finding it hard to tell if there was anything he'd need to know more about without first experimenting with what Bellatrix had now told him. He didn't have a practice wand, as Bellatrix had so helpfully pointed out before, and didn't know how good or bad his aim would be. At the same time practicing his aim was the only thing he could come up with that would give him something to do.

"Is this going to be taught at Hogwarts?" Harry asked then. It seemed like such simple but useful logic, and it was hard to tell if it was something everyone was going to know or if it was something he could just... keep close to his heart and use to his advantage should he ever need to.

"No," Bellatrix sneered. "Those little blood traitors know nothing, and simply drift from day to day, getting duller as time passes. They will be defenseless when the Dark Lord rises again, and not even their little Boy-Who-Lived can help them."

"Neville Longbottom, right?" Harry asked, vaguely remembering the name that had popped up here and there as he'd studied history or read the Daily Prophet. "Will he be at Hogwarts?"

"Yes," Bellatrix said sourly. "That little vermin. Him and his parents - they'll be the first to go, I promise you. And oh, it will be painful. I will make it painful for them. There are scores waiting to be settled."

'Yikes,' Harry thought. He didn't really feel one way or another about the Boy-Who-Lived, but then again... he also didn't feel much about the Dark Lord or any of the people Bellatrix kept hissing about.

For all he knew, this Dark Lord that Bellatrix kept harping about was dead.

And frankly, even if he wasn't-- none of this was Harry's business anyway. He had enough things to worry about without getting involved in things that were clearly complicated. Harry was just going to keep his head down and stay out of the way. That he was absolutely certain of.

*

Harry woke up on Friday feeling sick.

Not— not the kind of sick that would’ve kept him from his lessons. Just sick enough for him to be aware of the nausea toeing the line of tolerance. It certainly kept his thoughts in line for the first few moments after waking, purely occupied with whether or not he'd be throwing up soon. And it was only after deciding that perhaps not, that he noticed the sound of... something coming from outside his room.

Footsteps. Shuffling footsteps, familiar footsteps that hadn't come to his room in ages. She was walking in the hallway, slowly but steadily coming closer, and there was something terrifying about that.

Instinctively, without thinking of why, Harry found himself rolling out of bed and crawling under it instead. He hoped - desperately - that his mother would continue her way past the room, and felt cold when he heard the sound of his door being pushed open. Moments later he could see his mother's feet right in front of him, her coming to a stop right by his bed.

'Breathe with your mouth open,' Harry reminded himself, 'it's quieter.' He'd read about moving quietly in one of the many little booklets Uncle Tony had tossed his way. Though, to be fair, his godfather had likely intended for those skills to be used somewhere that wasn't Harry's own home.

He didn't know if Lily would try to look for him - if she was going to do that, then checking under the bed was surely the first thing she'd do. Merlin - he'd really have to figure out a better hiding place for the future, just in case. It couldn't be anything obvious, like the wardrobe or under the bed where he was now.

Luckily, Lily didn't search for him.

Instead she stood still for ages. Long enough to make Harry worry about running late to his lesson with Mrs. Goyle - she'd told him that this week they'd be going through some of the most notable pureblood families. He's not sure what he'd do with that information, anyway - would people at Hogwarts really care about such things? She's also asked him about learning French to be able to talk more, and how was Harry supposed to tell her that most days he didn't want to know English either?

Then again... Mrs. Goyle had her own ideas of what was important information and what wasn't - last time she'd lectured Harry about arranging furniture for gatherings, how to use utensils, what kind of a drink went with which dish, and various other matters that were just... not part of Harry's world, really.

No, Harry's world included things like his mother acting strange and coming to stand by his bed, apparently.

'I need her to leave,' Harry thought, wondering if there was anything left of James for Harry to use to lure Lily away. He didn't dare to risk it, however - the last thing he wanted was to have James dropping body parts in this room. Circe, just having Lily here felt awful. As if his own safe space was being invaded, and he didn't like that.

Eventually, having done nothing but stand still by Harry's empty bed, not attempting to look for him, Lily suddenly turned on her heels and ran out and down the corridor, her bare feet slapping loudly against the polished floors. The door was left open behind her, and Harry wanted so badly to move from his spot to close it at least, but he-- he couldn't. Lily's fast and abrupt movement had left him shaking and afraid, and he didn't dare to move from his hiding spot quite yet.

This turned out for the best, as soon after the sound of her loud footsteps disappeared, Harry felt... strange. Anxious, though that was to be expected, given the circumstances. He didn't dare to peek from under the bed, but did his best to hear every little sound around him. It didn't take long for him to realize that after having run away so loudly, Lily had then returned - quietly, so quietly - back to stand in the corridor outside Harry's room. She didn't come in this time, and Harry was sure that she was waiting for him to come out.

Why? He didn't know.

He didn't want to know.

He wasn't going to leave his hiding place unless he'd absolutely have to, and if that meant that he'd be skipping out on his lesson with Mrs. Goyle, then so be it. With any luck, Uncle Tony would come and fetch him and somehow fix this situation that Harry had found himself in unexpectedly. And if Uncle Tony didn't realize that Harry hadn't attended Mrs. Goyle's lecture, surely Mr. Crabbe would alert him to Harry's absence.

Merlin, what were other families like?

'Just focus on breathing,' Harry told himself then, trying stop his body from shaking. He still felt cold and sick, and anxious enough to nearly cry. He desperately wished for a solution - anything to get him out of this situation - while thanking his lucky stars for waking up just in time to hide. He didn't want to think of waking up to see Lily looming over him. Could he have called a house-elf? What was the likelihood of them helping him against his mother, anyway, when she was the one who still, being his only surviving parent, had the final say in almost everything concerning Harry and Mordred's Mend.

No, he couldn't call for a house-elf. Those things weren't to be trusted.

Then again - who was? No one could be trusted, could they?

Harry took a deep breath, slowly and quietly, still trying to remain calm despite the fearful chaos inside his head. He resigned himself to staying where he was for the time being, desperately vowing to start keeping a knife near him at all times, just in case. After all in times like these, when he didn't even have a wand yet, all he could do was try and hit where it hurt, just like Bellatrix had taught him. He felt stupid for not having taken that precaution yet, as now he was left only with the option of remaining where he was, waiting to be rescued.

There wasn't anything else he could do, was there?

*

Harry didn’t go to his lesson with Mrs. Goyle. In fact, he didn’t go to his session with Mr. Crabbe either, though perhaps he could’ve.

He didn’t know how much time had passed with him hiding under his bed, too afraid to move or let out a sound. He dared to peek from under his bed, once, and saw that Lily _wasn’t_ standing at the doorway.

‘Is she there?’ Harry wondered, doubting himself more and more with each passing minute. And yet, he couldn’t quite overcome the knowledge that though he had heard Lily sneak back towards his room, he hadn’t heard anything - including the sound of her sneaking _away_ \- ever since. Which meant that no matter how quiet she was being, she had to be still there.

When Harry heard his godfather’s voice calling for him from downstairs, two things happened: firstly, Harry knew now for sure that he was late from his class with Mrs. Goyle. Secondly, _abruptly_ , he heard Lily stomping away. Which, in itself, was odd. Harry couldn't remember his mother ever being in the habit of stomping. It was something she had started doing only recently.

And— and he’d been right. She had been waiting for him quietly, all this time. What did she want? She could’ve easily found him under his bed - why didn’t she, if she wanted him?

The thoughts of how his mother walked were pushed aside as Harry could finally crawl out from under his bed. He didn't know where to even begin explaining what had been happening so far in his day, and yet he knew that he'd have to. Uncle Tony wasn’t going to let this slide, that much was clear.

“Something is wrong with your mother,” Uncle Tony said immediately, and something about the way he said it made a lump form in Harry’s throat. He swallowed, eyes burning. “What happened? Did she do anything to you?”

“I was hiding,” Harry replied. “She didn’t find me - didn’t look for me. But she came to stand by my bed for ages and then hid to wait by the door. I don’t— I don’t know what’s going on.”

Uncle Tony’s face twitched into a grimace before he dug out his wand and beckoned Harry closer to the doorway. Without explaining anything, the man tapped the tip of his wand against Harry’s hand, before then waving it in the doorway, muttering something at a volume too low for Harry to hear. It was fairly easy to guess what was happening, however, when what seemed like rippling air manifested at the doorway, before fading back into nothingness again.

“She can’t enter your room now, even if the door is open,” Uncle Tony said. “No one but you and I can enter this room.”

“Thank you,” Harry replied, hesitantly then asking: “should I now go to the lesson with Mrs. Goyle even though I’m late?”

“No,” Uncle Tony said immediately. “In fact, today you needn’t bother with Crabbe either. Have you had breakfast yet? I assume not. Let’s go.”

It wasn’t something Harry was used to - eating out, that was. In fact, he’d never done it before, and wasn’t sure what to expect. And so by the time he had washed up, gotten changed, and then taken by his godfather to some café in Moscow, he was quickly becoming distracted from what had happened with Lily. He couldn’t _forget_ or stop feeling anxious, but it was easier to tell himself to not think about it with physical distance and so much change around him.

And, and— he had a barrier there now. (What if it didn’t work?)

“Here we are.”

The place didn’t look like much from the outside, but on the inside it was nothing like anything Harry had seen. It was large and bright, with round tables and pretty chairs and bright green plants everywhere. It wasn’t full, but even the presence of the few people there was strangely exciting and scary. He didn’t think he’d ever seen this many living people at once, and though Mr. Crabbe had discussed this issue with him, they hadn’t done any actual practice to get Harry used to people.

Luckily he was with Uncle Tony, who led him towards a table that was fairly secluded, and pushed him to sit down. Moments later a piece of paper with a list of food and drink options - written in Russian, allowing Harry with his limited grasp of the language to recognize only a few - appeared. Occupying himself with making sense of what was written made it even easier to push any thoughts of the morning into a small corner, temporarily stored away.

The denial could’ve lasted longer, but the moment they had both placed their orders - or rather: Harry had told his godfather what he wanted, who then relayed that to the waitress - Uncle Tony said: “We need to talk about Lily.”

Ah.

“All right,” said Harry, hands on his lap, barely able to hold himself back from hunching his shoulders and looking down. He tried to search for the right words to continue with, eventually settling with: “She’s never done that before. The whole… waiting thing.”

“Has she done other things?”

Harry almost shook his head, but then stopped to think. He had been so used to Lily ignoring him, he hadn’t realized that she was starting to pay attention to him again. And yet now that he thought about it, she had started just… turning her head towards him more. Walking by his room more often. If he was in the living room or the kitchen, she’d sometimes come to stand by the doorway and just… watch him. And then that stomping run that she had recently started doing— did people just change the way they ran suddenly?

“She just looks at me,” Harry replied. “She never says anything, though.”

“And where is James?”

That… was a really good question. Harry would see James whenever Lily was outside, but it had been a while since he’d seen James indoors. “I don’t— I’m not sure.”

Uncle Tony let out an annoyed sigh, falling silent when the waitress returned with their food. When she left, he spoke again. “Do you recall anything happening to cause this?”

“No,” Harry said, shaking his head. “Nothing.” Besides, he’d been spending most of his time studying away from home, anyway. It was strange how things had changed. He could now leave Mordred’s Mend as many times as he wanted to, but Lily couldn’t. It used to be the other way around, and Harry never actually thought that they’d reach a point where his mother would be nothing but a living ghost haunting the hallways of her own home.

Circe, what a life.

“I asked Nott why people are scared of dying,” Harry said, “but isn’t living like that scarier? Wouldn’t it be better to die fast rather than be… like mum.”

Uncle Tony looked at him then, no signs of his earlier annoyance. On the contrary, the man appeared almost sympathetic - something Harry rarely witnessed. It seemed, however, that despite it being Elli Nott who was obsessed with death, it was Uncle Tony who really understood Harry’s feelings on this matter. Encouraged by the nod, Harry continued:

“Is there a way to kill someone fast?”

“There are many ways to do that.”

“But painlessly,” Harry said, thinking of Bellatrix. “Just, you know. I mean, I know Bellatrix does things like that for fun and she just… takes a lot of time. She’s told me a lot about the things she did in the war. I don’t want any of that. I don’t want to hurt people.”

Antonin nodded again, a hint of a smile appearing. “I’ll tell you, but you must remember to not discuss these matters with _anyone_ \- not even Crabbe, and certainly no one you’ll meet at school.”

“Of course,” Harry replied, cutting a piece of his tvorog and caviar blini, thinking that if keeping secrets was all it took for Uncle Tony to tell him interesting things, then surely it was easiest thing to promise.

“Humanity has been drifting from war to war, conflict to conflict, throughout the times,” Uncle Tony began. “And with that, wizards and witches have developed increasingly efficient ways to attack and defend. Some of those spells were darker than others, and eventually three in particular rose to infamy: Avada Kedavra, Cruciatus, and Imperio. It didn’t take long for the Wizengamot to label these three curses as unforgivable, and it was declared in 1717 that dire consequences would befall anyone who uses them.”

“The Unforgivables,” Harry realized, having heard of the curses before, but hadn’t really read anything specifically about them.

“Yes,” Uncle Tony said, nodding. “Today the use of any of those three will lead to a life sentence in Azkaban. Do you know what they do?”

“Vaguely?”

“The Imperius Curse,” Uncle Tony started, his voice low and steady as he spoke, “is unique among the three, as it is that only one that can be defended against. When correctly cast, it places the target completely under the caster’s control, which can last for decades. I could have you eating your own arm and you wouldn’t even hesitate.”

“Incredible,” Harry said, picking up another piece of his blini and eating it, wondering if his own little teeth could really chew through the skin of his arm to eat it, even with a curse in place.

“They all are,” Uncle Tony replied. “Then we have the Cruciatus Curse. It inflicts pain so intense and excruciating, it can - and has - driven its victims insane. Despite popular misconceptions, however, it does not cause physical harm. The only way to identify it is by residual magic which doesn’t linger for a long time.”

Unlike the Imperius Curse, Harry couldn’t find much to like about this one. Again - where was the fun in causing someone pain?

“Then the third one, which is the one that will matter the most to you,” Uncle Tony continued. “The Killing Curse. It causes instantaneous and painless death, without causing its victims any injury, and leaves no traces of violence.”

“Why is it an unforgivable?” Harry asked, almost frantic. He’d never heard of a spell so perfect, and here Uncle Tony was telling him that using it would come with a prison sentence! _Why?_ “If it’s painless and fast—? Surely it’d be better for Li— mum to die like that than be whatever she is right now, right?”

Uncle Tony looked pleased when he replied: “The unavoidable nature of an instant death is frightening to people, though I’m sure you’ll be told all about how _bad_ these curses are eventually. You mustn’t disagree with them. Now, to another question: do you believe your mother will ever become better?”

Harry paused at that, caught off guard by the question. “What?”

“You said that it’d surely be better for Lily to die painlessly and quickly, than live the way she lives now,” Uncle Tony said. “That’s not quite the same as euthanizing someone with a fatal wound, now is it?”

Harry fell silent, unsure of what to respond to that. He didn’t know what to think. He _had_ said that, but he hadn’t really thought about it. He had spent so long thinking of things that could maybe bring Lily back, and now he couldn’t even point when exactly those thoughts had ceased.

“I’m not reprimanding you, on the contrary,” Uncle Tony said. “Your pragmatic approach to your mother’s condition is admirable. Grief does strange things to the human mind, and I personally do not think your mother can come back from it anymore.”

Harry nodded, hating what he was hearing, and hating even more that he also didn’t think his mother would ever return to how she used to be.

However, there was just… one thing. One little thing that he couldn’t quite shake off, and it’s the same thing that made his thoughts return to his mother’s stomping. Was it truly grief that had made her now turn to Harry and lie quietly in wait? Was it grief that turned her head and had her eyes following him?

Was Lily still grieving, or was this something else?


	4. Mama's Boy

Harry returned from his meeting with his godfather feeling hollowed out, and yet hopeful. The spell his uncle had told him about – the Killing Curse, Avada Kedavra – sounded like the very heart and soul of mercy. In fact, the more he thought of it, it felt less like a spell he needed to learn and more like a friend he couldn’t wait to meet.

 _‘It wouldn’t hurt her,’_ Harry thought, climbing up the stairs quietly. Lily was thankfully nowhere to be seen, and so he could simply sink into his thoughts and forget about the strangeness of his life for a moment. When he closed the door of his room, he locked it, briefly wondering if he should take a look into the cupboard or under the bed – just to make sure Lily wasn’t hiding there.

But no— Uncle Tony had said that she wouldn’t be able to enter, and Harry believed him.

“Vurney,” Harry called, taking off his jacket and throwing it carelessly on the bed. He heard the house-elf pop in, and turned to see it shaking by the doorway.

“Y-yes Master?” the thing croaked.

Harry, who had been about to ask for a cup of tea and something small to snack on, couldn’t quite push the words out. The mundane request crumpled into a barbed tangle somewhere in his throat, and the only thing he could think was: _‘Why do you think I would hurt you?’_

Wasn’t it unfair that he was being treated like this? He hadn’t done anything bad, and yet everyone treated him as if he was the worst of mankind. Nott had said that creatures could tell that there was something off about him, but why was being a necromancer something _off_? Wasn’t death natural enough to not be treated like a horror?

Resentment, deep and dark and angry, splashed inside of him. It felt simultaneously like a deep, bone-rattling ocean of rage, and a small, barely blooming little flower inside of him.

“Where’s Lily?” Harry asked, no longer interested in tea.

Vurney startled, before shakily replying: “M-master’s mother is in her room.”

For a moment Harry entertained the thought of asking more: had she eaten? Had she slept, or showered, or done anything more than wander around? He almost did, opening his eyes with the question ready to spill out, but stopped because—if he asked, did that mean that there was an answer he wanted to hear? Would asking make him hope foolishly?

“Tell me if she leaves,” Harry then said, before turning away from the elf. He would take a shower, and then settle in to read something – anything – to keep his mind occupied. Bella had been right – if only Harry had a wand of some sort, he could keep himself occupied even better by practicing the things she’d told him about. Now all he could do was simply… read and wonder if it was too early to start counting days till he’d get to go to Hogwarts.

And, Harry promised himself, once he went to Hogwarts and got his wand, the first spell he was ever going to learn would be the Killing Curse.

*

When Harry opened his eyes, he knew immediately that he was somewhere in the Woods. The air around him was cold and wet, as if he was caught in invisible mist. The ground was wet underneath him, sticks and stones poking at his bare feet like sharp and cold fingertips, making him shift in discomfort. The trees were still and silent - and one would _think_ that that’s how trees were supposed to be, and yet… their stillness felt temporary, as if they were simply imitating ordinary trees, waiting for Harry to no longer be wary of them.

He didn’t know how he had ended up there - had he sleepwalked? Crabbe had told him that sleepwalking indicated a heightened risk of schizophrenia, but he’d never sleepwalked before. He didn’t want to be sleepwalking out of the safety of his bedroom with Lily lurking in the corridors - as if the corridors on their own weren’t dangerous enough. Not to mention leaving the House at night had just… he’d never done that before, and Harry was _barely_ managing to keep his fear at bay now. He didn’t know what he was supposed to do, only that he wasn’t supposed to be _here_.

The sound of strange, mournful wailing in the distance snapped him out of his thoughts. Drawn-out screams that made his heart beat harder as he squinted at the darkness between the trees. He couldn’t begin to guess what kind of an animal made sounds like that, but as it didn’t seem to be getting closer to him, he desperately hoped that he wouldn’t need to worry about it. Especially when he still needed to figure out how to get back home.

 _‘I can’t be far,’_ Harry thought, looking at his bare feet. They didn’t hurt, which surely was an indication that he hadn’t walked for a long time before reaching this place, right? The ground let out wet squishing sounds as he hesitantly moved a few steps before stopping again. He could barely see clearly two feet in front him, the treetops shielding away the moonlight that perhaps could’ve helped him figure out where to go.

 _Merlin_ , if only he had a wand that he could use to navigate. Or any source of light. _Merlin_ , if only he’d brought matches or _anything_ with him for some light. He’d always wanted a source of light for him to rely on, and yet now he had _nothing_.

The sound of the wailing continued, and Harry decided to head away from it. He didn’t wish to encounter whatever creature was willing to make noise in these Woods. Not when everything else was always so silent and still, as if frozen by the fear of being noticed.

The darkness intensified as Harry walked, and strangely enough no matter which way he went, he could still hear the wailing. His skin was cold and wet though he _felt_ hot and sweaty, becoming increasingly uncomfortable as he continued his way. He had no idea if he was heading towards the right direction, but what else could he do but try?

Eventually walking into wakefulness like a painting quietly bleeding its colours away, Harry opened his eyes to a darkness that wasn’t like that of the Woods. Disoriented and confused, he tried to make sense of what had just been happening. Hadn’t he _just_ been—

He wasn’t outside. He hadn’t been outside. He’d been dreaming. He’d _walked out_ of his dream. He was in his bed, and—

—and he could still hear the wailing. That sound must have been what finally woke him up, right? Someone - Lily, _of course_ it was Lily - was screaming.

“Vurney,” Harry called, his voice barely above a whisper. He pushed himself up to a sitting position, feeling cold. A shaking house-elf appeared in his room a moment later. He looked at it, once again resenting its fear - why was it scared of _him_ when his _mother_ was the one who— “What’s going on?”

“Master James is no longer moving,” the house-elf replied, avoiding eye-contact. “Mistress found Master’s remains by the fireplace.”

 _Fireplace_? The one Uncle Tony had disconnected from the Floo? What had James been trying to do there? Was it a coincidence? It _had to_ be - surely the corpse hadn’t been trying to get _out_? “And Lily found him there? She found him and now she’s screaming like a lunatic?”

“Y-yes Master Harry.”

Harry let out a sigh, cursing quietly. His fingers curled around the handle of a knife he had stolen from the kitchen before. “What time is it?” he then asked.

“T-two forty-seven, Master Harry.”

Fucking great.

Harry let out another annoyed sigh, before climbing out of the bed and heading towards the closed door. From the corner of his eye he saw the house-elf sweating and tearing up, its fear almost tangible. He hated it. How many years had it been? Harry had never hurt anyone - _surely_ they knew by now that there was no reason to fear him?

The doorhandle – made of metal – was warm, which made him pause for a moment. He then, hearing Lily let out another drawn-out wail, quietly opened his door and peeked into the dark corridor. He knew that the quiet darkness wasn’t to be trusted - especially at night - but he also couldn’t just ignore what he was hearing. Merlin knew what his mother could be doing, and he’d rather see for himself than just sit like a coward in his bed.

_He loathed fear. So, so much._

Hesitantly Harry left his room, leaving his slippers behind in an attempt to move as quietly as he possibly could. The knew which floorboards to avoid, though he doubted that Lily could’ve heard their quiet creaking over her cries. Despite this, Harry inched through the corridor carefully, stopping by the top of the stairs. From there he could look at the hall below, where he could now see Lily holding James’s torso to her chest, rocking back and forth while wailing by the fireplace. The man’s legs were in pieces, both feet lying by the bottom of the stairs - a parody of a pair of shoes. Had he tripped? Had he been trying to crawl to the fireplace before he gave up?

Harry curled up in his hiding spot, wondering what would happen next. Lily would have to let go of James eventually - but would she then snap back to reality? Was that a possibility? Merlin, if it _was_ — He didn’t want to hope too much, but he couldn’t _quite_ stop his heart from beating faster, thinking of the life he could have if Lily just…

…returned to _normal_.

*

He was a fool.

Hopeful, and a fool for it.

*

Things did change, though not the way Harry had hoped for.

“You’re expected to receive your Hogwarts letter soon,” Healer Crabbe said, leaning back on his chair, hands folded on top of the table. Harry wondered if the man ever felt the need to just _fiddle_ \- do _anything_ , really - with his hands in moments like these. When he’d just sit down and focus on listening, blissfully unaware of the faces in the ceiling and the occasional pitiful moan coming from under the coffee table. Harry didn’t want to think of how anyone could’ve died _there_. “How does that make you feel?”

Harry sat on the large white couch, too aware of the seams of his clothes and the topmost button of his shirt. The faint hum of a lullaby clung to him like a scent, though he doubted anyone else could hear it. He felt suffocated and anxious, and worst of all - even a bit disoriented. It was becoming harder and harder to make sense of things amid the strange events unfolding in his life, let alone try and figure out how _anything_ made him _feel_.

“I don’t know,” Harry replied eventually. He wanted to leave Mordred’s Mend but also _didn’t_ \- what would happen there in his absence? What if he went to Hogwarts and everyone was terrible to him there? He didn’t know what to expect but somehow just couldn’t believe that things would turn for the better. “I don’t know what to expect.”

Healer Crabbe didn’t say anything to that, and Harry sighed, trying to think harder about how he was feeling. It was just… so _difficult_. How could he make sense of his feelings when he couldn’t tell them apart? If he closed his eyes to focus, all he could see was Lily curled over James’s remains. She’d laid there for nearly a day before Harry had told the house-elves to bury James’s remains somewhere too deep for his mother to dig out.

And, Merlin, had _that_ been a disaster and a half.

Lily had been angry. Angrier than Harry had ever seen her. Right after James’s passing and resurrection, and before things had become _too_ strange, she’d been in a daze of some sort, not caring about anything that happened around her. Now she was angry and aware, and more disconnected from reality than ever before. After Harry had seen her crawling on all fours across the living room, he’d told the house-elves to keep her occupied every time he had to make the short trip from his room to the fireplace. And the shaking little creatures had agreed, preferring the company of that— of his _mother_ , even though _she_ was the one who was—

How was he supposed to explain how any of _that_ made him _feel_?

“I don’t want people to bother me,” Harry finally said, deciding to focus on his anticipated Hogwarts attendance. Crabbe nodded, encouraging the boy to continue. “I don’t know how often people like talking to each other, or what to even talk about. And what about the lessons themselves? What if I fail subjects or something?” What if everyone already knew each other and he’d be left as the odd one out? He liked being alone, but only if it was _his_ choice.

“Failing is very unlikely,” Crabbe said soothingly. “Your godfather has told me that you’ve studied quite a bit.”

“So has everyone else, probably.”

“There will be muggle-born students who only recently learned of their admittance to Hogwarts. Besides, not many students even from half-blood or pureblood families care to study school materials as diligently as you have. That said - everyone struggles in the beginning. You must keep in mind that demanding constant excellence is cruel.”

Harry didn’t care to point out that he didn’t have any school materials yet either - he didn’t even know which books he’d need to buy eventually - as he had studied the basics from a few scattered sources. Either way, most people likely didn’t have the burning need to escape into books and forget about their lives the way Harry did.

“Does sleeping in a dorm worry you?”

Sleeping where, now?

“Students at Hogwarts share sleeping areas with their classmates in every single House,” Crabbe explained, having seen the confusion on Harry’s face. “I assumed you knew of this?”

“Yeah,” Harry replied, unsure if he had been told anything about dorms at Hogwarts. It sounded vaguely familiar, so probably. He hadn’t actually thought about sharing his sleeping space with anyone else before - how could people just fall asleep and trust that no one would attack them? He’d need to ask Uncle Tony about it.

“Every new student is nervous,” Crabbe continued. “Try to look forward to whatever you might experience at Hogwarts. Most of us have found our lifelong friends and partners there.”

Harry mustered up a smile. He didn’t believe in lifelong anything - his parents hadn’t kept any of the friends they’d met at Hogwarts - but nodded regardless. Crabbe wasn’t a fool, but he just… he didn’t know how things went in Harry’s life. And without that, most of his advice was left aside, discarded as useless. Because despite how long they’d been doing this, Harry still wasn’t convinced that he needed a therapist.

But… at least he didn’t need to stay with Lily. He couldn’t yet leave Mordred’s Mend whenever he wanted to, and so these sessions, regardless of how useless he found them, did provide him with something he otherwise wouldn’t have had. And while this kind of avoidance wasn’t really a _solution_ , it was all he could have for now.

But not forever.

*

“I got my letter.”

Antonin looked at Harry, who had clearly been waiting to share his news. The boy had patiently sat through most of the lunch listening to his godfather, but couldn’t wait any longer.

“I see,” Antonin replied. “Congratulations, I suppose.”

“I thought the letter would arrive on my birthday,” Harry continued, picking at the fish on his plate. They were in Manchester, in a restaurant owned by a man Antonin knew to have sympathized with the Dark Lord back in the day. The restaurant was frequented by former Death Eaters, which had kept drawing Aurors for unannounced drop-ins for a long time. Eventually, when nothing suspicious was ever found, the Aurors moved on to other places - or at least became more subtle in their snooping. “But I suppose that wouldn’t make sense, right? I spoke with Mr. Crabbe about Hogwarts a few weeks ago, and they’ve got these Houses— Bellatrix thinks I’ll be a Slytherin, and—”

“You’re right, the birthday isn’t an exact timing, as every student needs to receive their letter a bit over a month before the semester begins,” Antonin interrupted, hoping to discourage any incoming rambling. “As for how Hogwarts is structured… they do have those four Houses, yes, but it’s completely irrelevant which one you end up in. From an outsider’s perspective such things do not matter, regardless of how important they appear while you’re in there.”

“But it matters to Bellatrix so much, and even though Crabbe tried to be neutral about it, he also definitely wants me to end up in Slytherin,” Harry pointed out. Antonin sneered.

“And what does that way of thinking tell you?” he asked. “They’ve left that school decades ago yet are still trapped in that _small_ way of thinking. You’ll encounter more people like that, but in the end their opinions do not matter. None of the Houses offer something the others don’t, and ultimately how the graduating students differ has nothing to do with which House they used to be in.”

“But will there be people who will treat me worse if I belong to a specific House?” Harry asked.

“Perhaps,” Antonin replied. “They’d be fools to do so, but idiocy isn’t uncommon. Therefore, the less you interact with those peers of yours, the better. You and they are made _different_. Do not lower yourself and accept their company, and though some will simply tell you to steer clear of people with lesser blood, I’d consider even that limitation too forgiving. You’re a necromancer— even purebloods must _earn_ your company.”

“Okay.” Harry’s little face was serious, and it was impossible to tell what he really thought of the things he was hearing. “In the letter they listed things I’d need to buy. Probably from Diagon Alley?”

Antonin wasn’t sure if the boy had ever been to Diagon Alley, and he couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to go there. “While many do choose to purchase their school supplies from the many stores of Diagon Alley, it is likely that we’ll only go there for your books. The other equipment, such as wand and robes, we’ll be getting from elsewhere. It is of great importance to value craftmanship in even the smallest of details, and there aren’t many capable of delivering that here. There are some in Russia, of course, and some more scattered across Asia and Africa. Each region has things they specialize in even if their expertise encompasses all elements of magic, purely due to how living conditions have shaped their heritage throughout the times. To learn herbology or healing, I’d have taken you to parts of Asia. For runes, I’d have taken you to South America. For your wand? That’ll be the Arabs - particularly the ones in central North Africa.”

“What about Britain?”

“Britain’s magical heritage centers around sacrifice and summoning, though they won’t readily admit that,” Antonin explained. “It’s why there are so many strange creatures here, and also why the rules to control wizards and witches are so elaborate - they developed alongside the need for them. This applies largely on the whole of Europe, not just Britain. If you find yourself interested, you should read about the Sirens of Switzerland.”

“Aren’t sirens water-bound?” Harry asked, confused. “Aren’t they the singing water creatures that lure people to their deaths? Switzerland doesn’t border a body of water, right? Why would they—”

“You’re not wrong, but do read about them, it’s an interesting case that shows how stupidity blooms in grounds fertilized by greed and ignorance,” Antonin replied. “People are criminally uneducated when it comes to history, not recognizing how important it is to understand how the world we exist in today came to be, and why is it the way it is – _nothing_ is without reason. The Dark Lord - and I hate to sound like Bellatrix - was exceptionally educated when it came to these issues.”

“Is that why you joined him?” Harry asked. Antonin almost smiled, appreciating the question as much as the anti-eavesdropping runes etched onto the tables.

“Not entirely, though that did play a part in it,” he replied. “The Dark Lord envisioned the world in a way I could resonate with.”

“My parents didn’t side with him, though. Why?”

Well, now… that wasn’t something Antonin wanted to get into. “Your parents had no strong political affiliations at all. They chose to simply remain aside throughout the war and focus their energy on raising you and maintaining a peaceful existence.”

The boy nodded, but it was once again hard to tell if his acceptance was genuine or if he simply wanted to move on. Antonin had noticed that Harry wasn’t the sort to push in a conversation - he’d try once, and if he didn’t get the response he wanted, he’d go at it differently the next time. Antonin wasn’t sure where the boy had picked that trait up, because it certainly didn’t come from his parents or Antonin himself.

“When will we go buy my school things?” Harry then asked, changing the subject entirely. “I need a wand.”

“You need much more than a wand,” Antonin replied, wondering if there was a particular reason for the boy’s focus on a wand in particular. Then again, with Lily still roaming around, was it any wonder? “We can do that next Saturday. I’ll come by Mordred’s Mend and have a word with your mother before we go.”

“Lily isn’t good at words anymore,” Harry replied. “But you’re welcome to try.”

*

In the end, Antonin didn’t have any words with Lily. When he came to Mordred’s Mend on that Saturday morning, the witch was nowhere to be found.

“It’s for the better,” Harry told him. “We should go now. To— where?”

“Ghadames,” Antonin replied, steering him towards the front door, wondering if he ought to insist on seeing the boy’s mother, before ultimately deciding not to. “Did you bring your list?”

“Yes,” Harry said. He had been unsure about the money needed for him to do his purchases, but apparently that wouldn’t be an issue – his godfather had kindly offered to pay for everything, as Lily clearly was in no condition to go to Gringotts and allow them entrance into the Potter vault.

“We’ll be going to a city called Ghadames,” Antonin said, surprisingly pulling him to a stop before they reached the fireplace. “It is an old, _old_ town, where some of the world’s finest craft-gifted individuals live. The work they do derives its excellence from the centuries of experience and knowledge that has never been allowed to leave the city’s borders.”

“Would they want to sell me a wand?” Harry asked, curious. “If it’s so… if they’re so secretive? Or are they fine with selling things, so long as the knowledge of how to replicate those things isn’t shared?”

“Something along those lines,” Antonin replied. “And someone owes me a favour, anyway.” The man then pulled out a stick, holding its other end towards Harry. “Latch onto that, we’ll be using a portkey as Flooing there is highly impractical.”

Feeling tendrils of excitement, Harry did as told. He had barely managed to get a hold of the stick, before they were spinning away, into a city he had never even heard of before. The thought that by the time he’d return here, he’d have his wand, gave him an immense feeling of relief. A relief that only deepened when they reached their destination, and Harry found himself standing right outside what appeared to be a wall surrounding the town.

“Seven clans rule in Ghadames,” Uncle Tony explained. “Each clan has its own entrance, which makes approaching the city harder, of course. Now, look – do you see the runes carved higher up on the wall? Those are protective Kufi signs – you’ll see a lot of them around.”

“This isn’t stone,” Harry said, touching the wall. It was firm and solid, rough to the touch, and yet he could tell it wasn’t made of stone.

“Mud and gypsum,” Uncle Tony said, leading Harry forward as he continued: “the whole town is made of that and reinforced with magic the kind of which even I cannot comprehend. The entrance that we’ll be using is the sixth one, and should be— Ah, there!”

“They don’t mind that we enter like this?” Harry asked, warily following his godfather towards and through one of the gates, and into the city. He didn’t know what to expect, but the moment he saw the tangle of alleys narrow corridors and closely huddled buildings, it felt… just _right_. The doorways arched and the windows curled and the buildings were painted in white.

There were no people wandering around, no dirt on the streets, no open vendors or noise. It felt as close to peace as Harry could possibly imagine.

“No,” Uncle Tony said, walking down one of the alleyways, clearly with a destination in mind. “Do not confuse their desire to keep their secrets as lack of welcome towards visitors – they are very welcoming people, open to the world and its wonders.”

“But where are they now? There’s no one here.”

“You’ll meet some if they wish to be met. Now – here we are. _Salam_ , hajjah Mansura.”

Uncle Tony had led them to a small, beautiful building with white walls and red paint. Harry didn’t know what they were in this particular place for, but it looked more like a teahouse than anything else, with floating teapots and comfortable seating. A handful of cats were lounging around, basking in the sunlight seeping in through the windows.

“Dolohov,” a woman behind the counter said, before continuing in a language Harry didn’t recognize. She was an exceptionally tall woman, with dark hair braided on top of her head, wrapped in a fabric that shimmered in the light. Uncle Tony replied in that same language, and after a few minutes of talking, Harry felt his godfather’s grip on his shoulder.

“This is my godson, Harry,” Uncle Tony said in English. “He’s here for his wand.”

“Of course,” the woman nodded, smiling warmly at Harry. She then reached for a drawer, and after a moment picked up a strangely short wand that she then handed to the boy. “We use this for _taqyiim_ – assessment. You can cast any small spell that you know – it doesn’t have to work right, so long as you manage to get your magic moving. That way we can have a taste of you, and when I go looking for wands for you to try, it’ll be more than just a guess in the dark. All right?”

Harry, feeling anxious all of a sudden, nodded. What if he ended up unsuitable for any wand? What if he didn’t have enough magic in him for a wand?

 _‘But what if I do end up having a wand,’_ he thought, wild hope blooming in his heart _. ‘A wand that will be perfect for me.’_ It didn’t seem believable, and even after he held back the assessment wand, the thought that anyone could – just from that – somehow figure out what kind of a wand would be perfect for him… it just didn’t seem possible.

And yet, when it happened… Harry didn’t know how to begin describing how _whole_ it made him feel. As if a cavity inside of him had been filled, and the aching pain from it was fading fast.

“What kind of a wand is it?” Uncle Tony asked, eyeing the almost cream-coloured wand with its dark, curling grain. Harry had never seen a wand like it before.

“It’s olive wood,” the witch told them. “It’s very strong, easy to work with. Known in myths and legends as a symbol of peace and friendship.”

 _‘Why would this be my wand then?’_ Harry wondered, though the thought of giving up on his wand now felt unbearable.

“The core was harvested from South Africa,” the witch continued. “It’s an Impundulu feather. I’ve never seen a living one, but an Impundulu – Lightning Bird, as people from overseas call it – is said to be as large as a grown man. It can summon storms and lightning. But we here know it as the protector of witch doctors.”

Harry wasn’t sure what to make of what the woman had told them, and was grateful when Uncle Tony once again took on the task of asking questions.

”What is it good for?” the man asked. “While the core origin is interesting, hajjah, how does it behave with magic?”

“It’ll be good with elemental spellwork,” was the response. “Fire spells and such. Healing, too. It’s not too good for dark curses – especially those meant to control other people in any way.”

“And you are certain that that is his wand,” Uncle Tony then said. Harry’s fingers tightened around his wand, and he knew that it was his. He didn’t care if it wasn’t suitable for dark magic, or if it stood for things that he couldn’t possibly have – peace and friendship, of all things. He didn’t _care_ – this was his wand, and he wasn’t going to give it up.

“I do not know what makes you doubt,” the witch said, “but rest assured, I know what I’m doing. That’s why you’re here.”

When Uncle Tony switched back to that other language to continue the discussion, Harry looked down at his wand. His pretty and strange wand, and Merlin he had never been this fond of strangeness before. Because this strangeness was his friend, and— Hadn’t the witch said that the olive tree wood his wand was made of stood for friendship? Not to mention that amid all that talk about lightning and fire and elements, she had said that the creature whose feather was at the core of his wand was also some sort of a protector. It had to mean something, right?

Was it pathetic to feel so comforted by an object, not for what it was, but for what it represented?

 _‘We’re family now,’_ Harry thought, looking at the wand. _‘You and I, we’re all the family we want.’_

So happy he knew that if he knew how, he would have been able to cast any spell, including the Killing Curse. Maybe soon he’d get to do that, if he could convince Bellatrix to teach him.

Happiness had never been so reachable.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you enter Libya, and cross countless of miles into the desert to the west, right before you reach the Algerian border, you’ll find Ghadames, the oldest habitable city in the entirety of Sahara. At first, it’ll seem like a ghost city with its empty streets, but you’d notice by how clean and well-kept everything is that there are people living there. I went there briefly in early 2011 as part of a longer trip to Libya then, and to this day I’m hard pressed to think of a place more beautiful (IDK how it is now tho, since so much has changed). That’s why I wanted to include it here. It’s a place that deserves to be mentioned and appreciated. Also the Kufi signs are real btw, or at least were in early 2011.
> 
> And hajjah is a feminine term to a muslim person who has done the Hajj. I thought it would be a nice detail to throw in there, because Dolohov is a man of culture. At first I had him say “madame” but in Libya that’s not a common way to refer to anyone.


End file.
